In the aftermath of an explosion at U.S. Steel’s Clairton Coke Works that injured 20 workers in July 2010, the Allegheny County emergency management chief was grateful it hadn’t been worse. “By the grace of God, nobody’s dead,” Robert A. Full said. “It’s a miracle no one was killed.”

The 2010 accident—which prompted multiple lawsuits against the company and left one worker with burns over 40 percent of his body and permanent disfigurement—is part of a troubling pattern at the 125-year-old Coke Works.

It was followed by a catastrophic fire in 2018, an explosion in February that injured two workers and, just this Monday, an explosion that killed two and injured at least 10. After touring Clairton in 2017, a county health official called it “one of the most decrepit facilities I’ve ever see

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