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AK’s Ashland Coke Plant Wins Industry Safety Award

For the third consecutive year, employees at AK Steel’s Ashland, Ky., coke plant have earned the Max Eward Safety Award, presented by the American Coke and Coal Chemicals Institute (ACCCI). The award recognizes the ACCCI-member coke plant having the best safety record during 2007.
 

The 2008 Max Eward Safety Award recognizes the ACCCI-member coke plant with the best safety record during 2007.
 
The award was created to inspire and encourage ACCCI-member companies to improve their industrial safety programs and prevent personal injuries.
 
The award, which is named for a former chairman of the institute's Manufacturing, Environmental, and Safety and Health Committee, will be presented at ACCCI's May meeting.
 
Ashland coke plant employees worked all of 2007 with no OSHA recordable injuries. Hourly employees of the Ashland coke plant are represented by United Steelworkers (USW) Local 523.

 
"Congratulations to our employees at the Ashland coke plant whose incredible dedication to safety has earned them this coveted recognition for the third year in a row," said James L. Wainscott, Chairman, President and CEO of AK Steel. "It is especially significant that they worked all of 2007 without a single recordable injury."
 
This award also marks the tenth time in the past 11 years that an AK Steel coke plant has been selected for ACCCI's highest safety honor. The company's Middletown, Ohio, coke plant is a seven-time recipient of the Max Eward Award. It also had an outstanding safety performance last year, experiencing only one OSHA recordable injury and finishing second in the industry-wide competition for the Max Eward award.
 
"The employees of AK Steel's Ashland coke plant have made safety their top priority," said Bruce Steiner, President of ACCCI. "Coke plants are challenging work environments from the standpoint of keeping employees
safe, and AK Steel has done a tremendous job year after year at both Ashland and Middletown to protect its most important asset—its people. The Ashland plant's employees and managers are to be congratulated for their extraordinary 2007 safety record and demonstrating that they are working under the principle of Safety First."
 
AK Steel produces flat-rolled carbon, stainless and electrical steels, primarily for automotive, appliance, construction and electrical power generation and distribution markets. The company employs about 6,500 men and women in Middletown, Mansfield, Coshocton, and Zanesville, Ohio; Butler, Pa.; Ashland, Ky.; Rockport, Ind.; and its corporate headquarters in West Chester, Ohio.
 
AK Tube LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of AK Steel, employs about 300 men and women in plants in Walbridge, Ohio, and Columbus, Ind. AK Tube produces carbon and stainless electric resistance welded (ERW) tubular steel products for truck, automotive and other markets.