A construction worker had to be airlifted off the Bryan County megasite in Ellabell, Georgia Friday afternoon.
Bryan County Communication Manager Nicholas Beard confirmed via email Friday evening that Bryan County Fire and EMS received a call about a person with chest pain on the construction site of the LG Energy Solutions battery plant facility known as HL-GA Battery Company. He did not note the time of the call.
Beard wrote that “a person was hit with a pipe during construction with possible internal injuries and had to be airlifted out.”
The Savannah Morning News reached out to LG and Hyundai Motor Group Metaplant America (HMGMA) Friday evening regarding an official statement on the injury, but one was not provided prior to publication.
While the battery plant is a joint venture between HMGMA and LG, HMGMA does not own the battery plant or oversee its construction.
HMGMA does have an emergency response facility that addresses fires, spills and worker injuries that may occurr on the metaplant as well as onsite affiliates’s sites. SMN has also inquired into the emergency response procedures at the megasite to gain understanding of how HMGMA’s emergency response team determines a call needs to be made to Bryan County EMS.
As recently reported by the Savannah Morning News, Bryan County EMS had responded to 91 calls at the megasite between January 2023 to August 2024. Another incident occurred on March 3 wherein a man was transported to Memorial Medical Center with a non-life-threatening injury.
In yet another incident, a construction worker identified in a Bryan County Coroner’s office report as Sunbok You, as first reported by WTOC, died on Friday, March 21 in a forklift incident at the battery plant site.
On March 24, WTOC reported details from a Bryan County Sheriff’s office report that stated, “You’s body was ‘laying behind the forklift’ and that photos taken at the scene show You’s body which was severed at the waist.
Update on March 3 incidient: Report shows nearly 20-minute gap between time of injury at megasite and dispatch
Megasite fatality in March: Hyundai confirms one construction worker died in fatal incident at Bryan County megasite
History of emergency calls: Bryan County EMS responds to 91 calls at Hyundai metaplant in 20-month span
Joseph Schwartzburt is the education and workforce development reporter for the Savannah Morning News. You can reach him at JSchwartzburt@gannett.com and JoeInTheKnow_SMN on Instagram.
This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: A construction worker suffers chest injury at Bryan County megasite