Photograph Source: Joe Piette – CC BY-SA 2.0
The first thing I noticed when I got to work at Amazon’s JFK8 warehouse in Staten Island one day in August was the revolting smell. It was like something had died. It turned out a major sewage leak had started hours earlier, and human waste was everywhere, even bubbling up from the floor.
Managers opened the windows, but the heat was making the smell unbearable. We were getting headaches, and some people fell ill.
With the help and coordination of our union — the Teamsters — JFK8 workers flooded the company’s internal complaint system with calls to shut the building down. We marched on managers in person to demand they close the facility. Eight hours after the sewage leak was discovered, the company sent us home.
Only an unmitigated disaster and strong collective action could draw out a humane response from Amazon.
I’ve worked at JFK8 for four years, an especially long time in the high turnover world of Amazon. What happened that day is just the latest in a string of horrible experiences that my co-workers and I have had to endure. That’s why we’re part of the growing group of Amazon workers demanding better treatment and working conditions by organizing with the Teamsters.
The post We Closed JFK8 After a Sewage Pipe Burst, One of Many Victories for Amazon Teamsters This Year appeared first on CounterPunch.org.
This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by Yackisha Nebot Lopez.
Yackisha Nebot Lopez | Radio Free (2025-09-30T05:44:03+00:00) We Closed JFK8 After a Sewage Pipe Burst, One of Many Victories for Amazon Teamsters This Year. Retrieved from https://www.radiofree.org/2025/09/30/we-closed-jfk8-after-a-sewage-pipe-burst-one-of-many-victories-for-amazon-teamsters-this-year/
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