- A worker at Jeep’s Toledo, Ohio plant reportedly died in an on-site accident.
- The victim’s name remains undisclosed but is believed to have worked on the Gladiator line.
- Stellantis has confirmed the incident but provided no further details.
A Stellantis employee working at Jeep’s plant in Toledo, Ohio, has died in a mysterious accident at the facility, local media reports.
According to comments made by Toledo Fire and Rescue Department to the city’s WTOL 11 TV station, the worker was crushed to death. Emergency services were alerted shortly after 1.30 pm on Wednesday but police haven’t revealed the name or sex of the victim, or exactly how the tragedy happened.
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Toledo’s WTOL 11 was quickly on the scene after the emergency call went out and learned from other Jeep employees that the dead person worked on the Gladiator line, rather than on the Wrangler line that is also located at the same plant. But Stellantis has so far declined to corroborate that intel, or comment much at all on the accident beyond admitting that someone died on its watch.
“Stellantis is aware of an incident involving one of our employees this afternoon at the Toledo Assembly Complex,” a spokesperson told Auto News in a statement. “The Toledo Fire Department was called for assistance. As this incident is currently under investigation, we cannot provide any further details at this time.”
If confirmed, this is the second fatal crush accident to take place at a Stellantis plant this year. In February, Domenico “Mimmo” Fatigati, a contractor hired to perform plant maintenance, was killed by machinery he was working on at a Stellantis production facility in southern Italy.
The accident will inevitably mean a sombre start to Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares’s visit to the US this week. Tavares is keen to work out a plan to fix the automaker’s underperforming North American operation, which he feels is responsible for the firm’s poor half-year results. Stellantis profits dropped by 48 percent in the first six months of 2024, a period in which rival automakers suffered no similar downturn.
