WHEELING — A crowd of around 100 people gathered around the Walter Reuther statue along Heritage Port Monday afternoon to honor the eight workers who died on the job in West Virginia in 2024.

The ceremony, hosted by the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), paid tribute to those who lost their lives while raising awareness about the ongoing fight to ensure workplace safety for all. April 28 was the 37th annual Workers Memorial Day, a time of remembrance for anyone injured, disabled or killed at work.

Wilbert Adkins Jr., Robert Amos, Ashley Cogar, William Crandall, James Kirk, Ryan Lantz, Virgil Paynter and Colton Walls were killed on the job last year. They worked in the public sector, coal mines and transportation.

The speakers at the event stood in front of the statue of Reuther, many mentioning him and his impact in their speeches. Reuther was a civil rights activist and leader in the American labor union movement and the president of the United Automobile Workers union for more than 20 years.

United Mine Workers of America International President Cecil E. Roberts gave an impassioned keynote speech on the frequent unjust treatment of laborers and the role that unions play in keeping workers safe.

Roberts emphasized the millions of families who have lost people due to workplace deaths and the importance of continuing activism efforts year round.

“If you really, really want to honor these fallen workers. Don’t do it in one day,” Roberts said. “Yes, we’re going to read the names of those who fell this past year. But what about those that fell last year, the year before last, the year before that?”

Roberts said when a worker dies on the job employers offer apologies; unions work to ensure it doesn’t happen again.

“The plant manager or the mine foreman, they won’t remember this next year. But that local union officer that knocked on the door, that person that worked beside him won’t ever forget him, and that never forgetting starts with this,” Roberts said.

The President of the Marshall-Wetzel-Tyler Labor Council, Art “Sonny” Oakland, noted that more than 21,000 West Virginia coal miners have died on the job since 1883 when fatalities began being tracked. This does not include the countless workers who have died from disease and other illnesses as a result of their job.

“Everybody has the right to work and to come home to their friends and families every day. They call these laws that protect us on the job blood laws because someone perished due to a problem that needed fixed,” Oakland said.

Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that there were more than 5,000 fatal work injuries in the United States in 2023 and millions more were injured or became sick as a result of their job.

“Clearly our job is not finished,” said Josh Sword, the president of West Virginia AFL-CIO. “Our nation’s job safety laws are dangerously weak, allowing scores of employers to violate the law without consequence or repercussion.”

The Occupational Health and Safety Act (OSHA), intended to protect workers from workplace hazards, was officially signed into law on April 28, 1971. There is currently proposed federal legislation to repeal OSHA.

“We all can play a role in this, right?” Sword said. “Our pledge is to keep fighting until one day, on April 28, Workers Memorial Day, there will be no names to read.”