SeaWorld is contesting the citation issued by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration in August 2010, which cited the company with a willful safety violation, its most severe category, and a $75,000 fine following a six-month investigation of the February 2010 death of trainer Dawn Brancheau.
SeaWorld has also pushed for the hearing to be closed to the public, and it is not clear what the final outcome will be for the newly forecasted hearing now slated for September.
Currently, SeaWorld is also embroiled in a wrongful termination lawsuit brought by former safety director Linda Simons. Simons is claiming that SeaWorld terminated her unlawfully and unfairly on the heels of Brancheau’s death, and after she made critical remarks against SeaWorld’s safety programs while cooperating with OSHA investigators. Simons, who started work at SeaWorld in Orlando one week before the incident, filed a federal whistleblower complaint in August 2010.
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