Honoring those who died on job

Most people head off to work expecting to come home a few hours later tired, maybe grumpy or fulfilled, but no one expects his life to end on the job.

The odds are on our side, but every year people do die working, and not just people in fields that we'd all agree have danger built into them.

Last year 81 workers died as a result of job-related injuries or illnesses in Washington.

The State Department of Labor and Industries held a memorial ceremony last week. The governor spoke, families came and rang a bell in the memorial garden at L&I headquarters in Tumwater.

The ceremony is held each year to honor the dead, acknowledge the loss of families, and "dedicate ourselves to keeping it from happening again," Elaine Fischer of L&I told me.

"It was a lovely, but sad ceremony," she said. So many of the dead were young people who had no thought of dying.

She gave me a list of the dead.

Lynette Anderson was a construction flagger working on Highway 101 when a dump truck backed over her. She was 49.

Ramoncito Barro, a residential-care manager. One of the people he cared for, a 91-year-old man, was charged with murdering the 39-year-old father of five.

Sergey Bateyko was crushed by a crate of glass in the manufacturing plant where he worked in Everett. He was 35.

Each entry in the list is a sorrowful tale, but most did not make big news.

There were farmworkers, plumbers, a mechanic, construction workers, truck drivers, a computer technician who fell through a skylight.

There where white-collar professionals. Stehekin School Superintendent Roberta Pitts was a passenger in a small plane that flipped in Lake Chelan a year ago.

Some jobs we associate with danger. There were fishermen and loggers on the list. There always are.

And there were police officers, whose deaths are more in the public mind because they are expected to face dangerous people on behalf of the rest of us.

Last year was a particularly bad year for police-officer deaths in Washington.

But the list reminds us of the risk of deadly violence inherent in some other kinds of work as well.

A motel manager and a restaurant owner were slain.

And the list shows that officers face more than bullets.

Ellensburg police Sgt. Nelson Kai Ng died after contracting hantavirus from mouse droppings apparently at a firing range.

Police know their job is dangerous. They train and prepare for that; maybe that's part of the reason they are less likely to die than construction workers, whose craft is always near the top of the list along with manufacturing and agriculture.

Truck drivers also face a greater danger than most. Anybody who has to drive for work takes a risk, Fischer said.

"Most people don't think that an injury or accident at work will happen to them or anyone they know, and when it does it is devastating," she said.

The department does a lot of outreach work, not to scare people out of leaving the house, but to increase awareness of the dangers so that businesses and workers will take precautions.

There were 13 cases of death by asbestos-related disease on the list, people who died long after their contact with the material. If any job-related danger has been publicized, it is asbestos.

So I was surprised when Fischer said the department still finds lots of asbestos problems, exposed material or workers who don't wear proper masks.

People freak out over swine flu but disregard more mundane dangers.

The statistics on workplace deaths may lack drama, but needless deaths are full of pain.

Stay alert.

Jerry Large's column appears Monday and Thursday. Reach him at 206-464-3346 or jlarge@seattletimes.com.