One year after Tampa Electric's Big Bend accident: Where are we now?

APOLLO BEACH -- One year ago today, a maintenance procedure at Tampa Electric's Big Bend Power Station went horribly wrong, killing five men.

Last June, five contract workers were performing maintenance on Unit 2, a coal-fired boiler at Big Bend, when it erupted and spewed a magma-like substance called slag.

Two men -- Christopher Irvin, 40, of Tampa, and senior plant manager Michael McCort, 60 -- died at the scene. Antonio Navarrete, 21, Frank Lee Jones, 55, and Armando J. Perez, 56, died in the following weeks.

Gary Marine Jr., one of the contractors, was the only one who survived.

A Tampa Bay Times investigation of the incident revealed that Tampa Electric knew the dangers of the procedure and still went ahead. The utility had created specific guidelines in 1997 for handling the maintenance after a worker, Carlton Nelson, was inured while performing the same procedure.

Here's where we are, one year later:

• Federal investigators found Tampa Electric ignored its own rules and fined the utility $126,749.

In an investigation, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration gave Tampa Electric a "willful" violation, a designation reserved for when companies act with indifference for the safety of their employees or knowingly disregard their rules.

It is one of the most serious violations, and makes Tampa Electric only the second utility in Florida to receive a willful violation since OSHA was established in 1971.

As part of the sanction, OSHA also fined the utility $126,749.

Tampa Electric is still contesting the "willful" violation.

• Tampa Electric has a new CEO whose focus is safety.

Nancy Tower, 58, succeeded Gordon Gillette, 57, at the end of 2017, about six months after the Big Bend accident. She was a longtime executive at Tampa Electric's Canadian parent company, Emera Inc.

Safety is one of her top priorities. In February, she spoke with the Times about the broad strokes of her five-year safety plan for the company.

"I feel we're making progress," she said in an interview with the Times. "We've done some safety audits and the results have been good."

Tower's plan includes updating safety procedures, implementing a safety management program for contracted workers, safety training, an audited comprehensive safety system and greater presence of company leadership.

The utility is also conducting a cultural assessment of its employees in coming months to understand their perceptions about safety.

• Safety leadership positions were created following the accident.

As part of Tower's push toward safety, she created and filled the position of vice president for safety, who reports directly to her. She also appointed a new plant manager at Big Bend.

• Tampa Electric is planning on building a memorial for the workers in Apollo Beach.

According to Tower, the memorial and a picnic pavilion will be built close to Big Bend. Though the company is still in early stages of planning, Tower said the cost of the memorial would not be passed to ratepayers.

• Contractors were injured in another accident at Big Bend in October 2017.

Just four months after the incident that killed five workers, two more contractors were injured at the plant. Donald Gansner and James Carter, who worked for contractor Zachry Industrial Inc. at the time, arrived at the facility to fix a water leak in the Unit 3 boiler's cooling system.

Before they could make any repairs, they were hit by a column of water two feet in diameter that left Gansner with "permanent total disability" and Carter with a compression fracture in his spine, according to lawsuits the men filed against Tampa Electric.

OSHA conducted an investigation and gave the utility a "serious" violation, as well as a $76,050 fine.

Contact this reporter at mcarollo@tampabay.com or (727) 892-2249. Follow @malenacarollo.