Today marks the third day of Workers' Memorial Week of Action, and we show no signs of letting up yet. We've shared infographics, released a report, held a press conference, and hosted a Facebook Town Hall. We've also conducted several interviews and been highlighted in many media outlets. (We'll post about our coverage in the future.) Tomorrow, we're gearing up to storm Twitter and let the Twittersphere -- and everyone else -- that too many workers face untimely deaths on the job, and that we must take action to prevent more from doing the same.
Below, we'll share some Twitter tips to get you all started, including Twitter handles to target, hashtags to use, and even sample tweets. But first, we wanted to take the time to remember Eva Macias (right), a 66-year-old Mexican immigrant who was killed on the job at a waste management facility in San Leando, Calif.
A native of La Palma Michoacan, Mexico, Eva arrived in the United States in 1969. Eva worked most of the time after that, as she and her husband, Victor, raised three children.
For about 30 years, Eva worked in an East Bay plant making wood for number 2 lead pencils. When it closed, she was hired at Waste Management’s Davis St. material recycling and transfer plant in San Leandro. It is North America’s largest recycling company.
Eva thrived there for 13 years, working as traffic director (a flagger), directing the public to drop-off areas.
It all ended on June 18, 2012. About 3:00 p.m. on that day, she was hit and run over by a front-end loader driven by a co-worker. The man was a 22-year employee in the small department where everyone knows one another.
The 5-foot-three-inch woman was wearing a reflective sweater, hardhat, and glasses. But the bucket on the loader was off the ground high enough so that the operator couldn’t see people walking in front of him. Six members of the public were on the site, emptying trucks of recycling materials. Two saw the loader hit Eva, snagging her shirt and lifting her in the air before she fell to the ground and was run over.
Eva died that night in hospital. She left behind her husband, children, five grandchildren and nine siblings.
“We miss her very, very much,” her daughter, Maria, said. “I miss everything -- our dinners together, the family being together. It’s different now. Everything’s different.”
Read more about Eva's story and what happened in the wake of her death.
It's because of stories like Eva's that we continue our fight for safer workplaces. Eva was just one of the 4,609 workers who died on the job in 2011.
Here are some Twitter tips we can all use tomorrow to draw attention to stories like Eva's, and like so many other workers'.
