Federal investigators are looking into the cause of the tragic implosion at a paper and packaging mill in Longview, Washington.
The effort is being led by an independent U.S. federal agency, the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB). A state Labor and Industries investigation is also underway.
After a chemical tank used in pulp production collapsed and crumpled at the Nippon Dynawave Packaging Company, more than 550,000 gallons of toxic “white liquor” spilled, killing 11 workers and badly injuring at least eight others. State ecology officials also collected thousands of dead fish. Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson declared it the “deadliest industrial tragedy in modern Washington state history.”
For more than three decades, the CSB has independently probed these kinds of incidents under the authority of the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990. However, federal funding for the watchdog agency was zeroed out in President Trump’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2027. Trump said its functions were duplicated by the Environmental Protection Agency.
U.S. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, a Democrat representing Washington's 3rd District, spearheaded a bipartisan push to keep the CSB in operation, using her position as a member of the House Appropriations Committee. She told KNKX the effort was already underway before the accident, with many members wanting to protect American manufacturing and ensure support for skilled American workers.
The committee secured more than $5 million in additional funding after the implosion in Longview. Key support for that funding came from Rep. Dan Newhouse, R-Washington, and Rep. Mike Simpson, R-Idaho, among other Republican lawmakers who serve with Gluesenkamp Perez on the Appropriations Committee.
Mill jobs on the line
Gluesenkamp Perez said the loss of human lives is devastating. She is also concerned about the spinoff effects for the local economy. The Nippon Dynawave mill is one of two left in the Longview area that take wood chips and make them into paper products.
“If we lose this mill, that is going to have profound impacts on the ability to have wildfire thinning,” Gluesenkamp Perez said, referencing a hot-button issue as the region experiences increasingly frequent summer smoke outs from blazing forests left largely untouched by foresters.
More active thinning is viewed by ecologists and resource managers as a solution that creates jobs while reducing the risk of the most severe wildfires.
“I mean, all the non-saw material, all of the residuals, like that's what gets turned into food-grade paper and paper and cardboard,” Gluesenkamp Perez said.
She added that if these mills close, access to paper products will become more challenging, which could result in more plastics being used. At the same time, of course, jobs will be lost.
The Longview mill is currently shut down. The labor union that represents the workers secured a deal with the owners of Nippon Dynawave to ensure that the more than 500 idled workers at the plant are paid their full regular wages through the first week of August. Gluesenkamp Perez said about 1,000 other jobs that depend on the mill could be at risk, because the slurry it generates powers an adjacent steam plant. Those wages are spent locally, supporting additional jobs and the local economy.
Glusenkamp Perez said safety rules that are in place for such facilities need to be enforced. But she also wants to strike a balance between new environmental regulations to protect air quality and keeping the timber industry safe and local.
“If we are demanding really high-level emissions controls from these mills out of concerns for population-level health risk, at the expense of infrastructure maintenance — like the non-sexy stuff — then you have environmental catastrophe and you have actual human beings who've lost their lives,” Gluesenkamp Perez said. “And so we can't be blind to the trade-offs that we're making, both with policy and with enforcement.”
A community facing uncertainty
Protecting working class jobs and careers in the trades is a signature issue for Glusenkamp Perez. So when she got a text with the news of the disaster, she dropped everything to find out what was going on.
“I called my buddy, who I know — you know, he works in mills now — and I was like, ‘Are you okay? Is your family okay?’ And he let me know that he was missing two cousins,” she said.
Both of those men died in the implosion, along with nine others. Glusenkamp-Perez said in places like Longview, everyone and everything is connected.
“The trades world — especially when you kind of narrow down to like machinists and millwrights — people all go to school together. They babysit for each other. And so it's like immediately very human terms and very close to the bone,” she said.
Beyond the tragedies for the families of the lost men, Gluesenkamp Perez said she is worried about the legacy that their work represents, especially as she considers the uncertainty of their sector in the years ahead.
“Timber really built our state. You know, like our public schools came from timber revenue — and that mill is one of two left in the state that take wood chips, which is crazy,” she said.
She said old-timers tell her there used to be three times as many millwrights and electricians, mechanics and machinists on these job sites.
“And so there was just more grace built into the system to allow for human beings to like — take time and care,” she said.
Now, the pressure is on them. And the idled plant in Longview, with the crumpled tank looming, stands as a testament to the challenges ahead.
“To attract talent to these trades, people need to know that the jobs are safe and that they're secure. And that there's a career path here that's durable and not going to be offshored to somewhere with no regulations,” Gluesenkamp Perez said.
Most of the answers will have to wait until the investigations by the Chemical Safety Board and the state Department of Labor and Industries wrap up. That could take months or years. In the meantime, Gluesenkamp Perez will be keeping an eye on all of this — and campaigning for her third term in Congress.
