Pressure to Work Faster, Lack of Safety Claim Lives at FedEx Packing Units
Despite the shipping giant claiming to have adequate measures in place to ensure workers safety, the situation on the ground is starkly different posing risk to the lives of those who labour at FedEx s World Hub in Memphis, one of its largest units in the world.
FedEx employees at work. Photo: facebook/ FedEx
 This story was originally published by ProPublica.
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Memphis: Fannie Stanberry had been on the job for two months as a package handler at FedEx Expressâ massive World Hub when, toward the end of her overnight shift, packages started to fall from a huge shipping container that rolled past her.
Wendi C. Thomas
MLK50: Justice Through Journalism
This ProPublica article was produced in partnership with MLK50: Justice Through Journalism, which is a member of the ProPublica Local Reporting Network.
Fannie Stanberry had been on the job for two months as a package handler at FedEx Express’ massive World Hub when, toward the end of her overnight shift, packages started to fall from a huge shipping container that rolled past her.
As Stanberry, then 61, bent to pick up the packages, she fell and became trapped between the catwalk she’d been standing on and the wheeled platform carrying the shipping container, also known as a dolly. “I thought I was a goner,” Stanberry said. She broke eight ribs and her left arm and lacerated her liver, she said. “I had to learn how to walk over again.”
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This article was produced in partnership with MLK50: Justice Through Journalism, which is a member of the ProPublica Local Reporting Network.
MEMPHIS, Tenn. Fannie Stanberry had been on the job for two months as a package handler at FedEx Express’ massive World Hub when, toward the end of her overnight shift, packages started to fall from a huge shipping container that rolled past her.
As Stanberry, then 61, bent to pick up the packages, she fell and became trapped between the catwalk she’d been standing on and the wheeled platform carrying the shipping container, also known as a dolly. “I thought I was a goner,” Stanberry said. She broke eight ribs and her left arm and lacerated her liver, she said. “I had to learn how to walk over again.”