The Lakeland Mills Coroner’s Inquest opened today at the Prince George courthouse.
Over the next month 47 witnesses will be called. They will range from mill employees, management and survivor to experts, investigators and first responders.
At the request of inquest counsel, a photo of each man killed in the explosion; Alan Little and Glenn Roche will hang in the courtroom for the duration of the inquest as a reminder of the tragedy. 22 other mill workers were injured in the fire.
Today opened with emotional testimony from the widows of Little and Roche. They described their partners personalities before diving into their accounts of two men that they said were worried with deteriorating safety conditions at the mill.
Alan Little’s common law wife of 8 years Joanna Burrows said her husband had been extraordinarily stressed in the 6 months leading up to the explosion, resenting his supervisor position due to a push from management for productivity he told her was at the expense of safety.
Ronda Roche read a statement saying her husband had even candidly commented that they had better save their money for when Lakeland eventually burned down. Ronda said Glenn was doubly concerned following the Lake Babine Mill explosion and made a comment to her saying “I think we could be next, and it could take me too.”
Alan Primrose, a co worker of Glenn Roche for almost 30 years, also took the stand. After describing the layout of Lakeland Mills for the jury, Primrose said he had voiced concerns alongside Roche and Little about the “frightening” level of dust in the mill that he blamed on sub-par staffing levels and pine beetle kill that created lighter, more dangerous dust.
Primrose also told the story of a fire at Lakeland that occurred on January 17th 2012, just 3 days before the Lake Babine Mill exploded. A fire occurred at Primrose and Roche’s station that “caught the air on fire” and scared them considerably. Following the Lake Babine explosion on the 20th, Roche and Primrose spoke on the phone about being scared to return to work.
In the weeks following, Roche and Primrose spoke to Alan Little about the dust buildup in their section, he shared their concerns and shut the section down on one occasion for cleaning before starting the mill. Two weeks before the Lakeland Mills fire on April 23rd Little moved into a different role within the mill.
The inquest is set to run the length of March. A 7 person jury will find cause of death and make recommendations with the aim of preventing a similar accident from happening again. The main goal of the inquest is to determine facts, not fault.