A worker at a tire factory in Indiana died after he somehow got stuck in a press, according to the Marshall County Coroner’s Office.
Marshall Hunt, 30, of Plymouth died at about 12:30am on Friday after getting caught in a tire press machine.
He worked at a Hoosier Racing Tire factory in Plymouth that makes tires for a variety of different vehicles, including drag racing cars.
G. Dean Byers told DailyMail.com that Hunt’s ‘head and neck’ was caught in the machine.
Byers said Hunt’s official cause of death was ‘multiple trauma,’ a medical term that’s used when a person suffers two or more fatal injuries at the same time.
Hoosier released a statement calling what happened to Hunt an ‘accident’ that happened while he was ‘performing his routine duties in the production area of the facility.’
‘We are deeply shocked by this tragic event and extend our heartfelt sympathies to the family members of the employee,’ the company said in the statement.
‘Hoosier highly values the safety and health of its employees. Together with local authorities, Hoosier has begun investigating the accident.’
Pictured: The factory in Indiana where Marshall Hunt, 30, died in a workplace accident
A tire press machine (pictured) is capable of exerting an enormous amount of force. It is certainly strong enough to kill a human being
A tire press machine is used to mount and dismount tires onto car rims. It’s not clear what specifications the machines were at the Hoosier factory in Plymouth, but there are tire presses capable of exerting 200 tons of force.
The human skull can only withstand 520 pounds of force before cracking, according to a bike-helmet study published in the Journal of Neurosurgery: Pediatrics.
Byers told DailyMail.com that his office will continue to investigate Hunt’s death alongside the Plymouth Police and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).
OSHA, which enforces safe and healthy labor standards in workplaces across the country, hasn’t publicly commented on Hunt’s death.
However, it’s been revealed that the factory where Hunt worked was the subject of two OSHA investigations.
Both investigations, one that began in December 2021 and another in April 2022, found ‘serious’ safety violations. OSHA fined Hoosier $4,500 for each violation.
It’s not clear what exactly the agency found unsafe about the facility, but it said Hoosier was in violation of an OSHA standard called ‘general requirements for all machines’ in both instances.
This rule stipulates that all machines in American workplaces need to be guarded by ‘one or more methods’ to protect ‘the operator and other employees in the machine area.’
Hoosier declined to comment about the OSHA violations.
