An employee’s death this week at the Dunkirk Specialty Steel plant on Brigham Road is under investigation.

A U.S. Labor Department spokesman on Thursday did confirm that “(the Occupational Safety and Health Administration) is currently investigating this incident and has six months to complete its investigation. More information will be available after the investigation is complete.”

Dunkirk Fire Chief Nicholas Barter said the city department responded to the incident, which was classified as an industrial accident, at the plant around 5 p.m. Monday.

Universal Stainless Steel headquarters in Bridgeville, Pa., did not return a phone call from the OBSERVER on Thursday afternoon. A call to the city plant was referred to the company attorney.

It is the first death at the location since 1995 when a worker was caught in a piece of machinery.

Universal Stainless took over the plant in 2002 after it closed in 2001. It has additional locations in North Jackson, Ohio, Bridgeville and Titusville, Pa.

In 2019, the company announced improvements to the 800,000 square-foot facility as it installed a new $10 million bar turn and burnish line, as well as a new General Electric phased array nondestructive testing system. The addition of the specialty equipment from Germany and Japan made the Dunkirk-based unit finishing cell the most advanced in the United States.

At that time, the location had 285 workers.

According to the company website, the Dunkirk facility produces finished bar, rod and wire products in a wide variety of specialty steel grades sold to service centers, forgers and original equipment manufacturers. The products are produced from semi-finished long products supplied from the Bridgeville and North Jackson facilities.