ARLINGTON, AZ — State regulators have voted to issue worker-safety violations to two companies after a contract worker died at an Arizona Public Service plant last year.
Mike Olver was employed by Bay Valve and working at the APS Redhawk Power Plant west of Buckeye. He was a senior valve mechanic who traveled to power plants and refineries around the country.
He died three days into a 10-day job.
The Arizona Division of Occupational Safety and Health (ADOSH) has now completed its investigation into his death. The report says Olver and three other employees were working with a crane to remove equipment on a third-story platform when that equipment began to tip toward Olver.
“He turned to run out of the way, and in the process, tripped over a wooden block and fell over the guardrail, falling approximately 18 feet,” ADOSH Director Brian Hudson said at a meeting Thursday.
According to ADOSH, the guardrail was 31 inches tall, 11 inches shorter than the required safety standard.
The Industrial Commission of Arizona, the state agency that oversees ADOSH, voted to issue citations and fines at a meeting Thursday. Bay Valve and APS both received a serious worker safety citation related to the guardrail. Each company was fined $11,524.
In a statement, APS said that nothing is more important than safety, and they will carefully review the conclusions of the report once it is shared with them.
“Our hearts go out to Mr. Olver’s family for the pain they’re going through. Mr. Olver was an employee of Bay Valve, which was contracted for maintenance work at the Redhawk Power Plant. We have not yet received the citation or the investigation report from the Arizona Department of Occupational Safety and Health,” the statement said.
ABC15 also reached out to Bay Valve for comment but have not yet heard back.
The ABC15 Investigators reported previously how Olver’s family was pushing for answers to what happened the day he died.
“He loved and adored his family. He always talked about his cute wife and how he married up,” his daughter, Brianna Olver, told ABC15 in an interview last year.
His wife, Jenny, last spoke to him on the morning of November 7th. Everything seemed fine. The couple lives in the San Francisco Bay area. Mike Olver had done work at the Redhawk Power Plant before, his family said.
“He was in a great mood,” she said.
She ended the call by telling him she loved him. They later exchanged a quick text message about plans for a Thanksgiving brunch.
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That afternoon, she got a call from his supervisor.
“There was an accident,” she said. “But he didn’t really know anything.”
Then another call came with devastating news.
The Maricopa County Medical Examiner said Mike Olver’s death was accidental, the result of blunt force trauma.
The family has been pushing for answers on what happened that day and awaiting the release of the ADOSH report.
“We just want to know what happened,” Jenny Olver told ABC15 last year. “And we don't want it to happen to anybody else.”
Email ABC15 Investigator Anne Ryman at anne.ryman@abc15.com, call her at 602-685-6345, or connect on X, formerly known as Twitter, and Facebook.
