After employees swept away in Helene flooding, Tennessee factory under investigation

JONESBOROUGH, Tenn. (WJHL) – Tennessee authorities are investigating the company that owns a plastics factory after workers were swept away by cataclysmic flooding unleashed by Hurricane Helene last week.

Two employees at Impact Plastics, located in Erwin, Tennessee, were found dead while more were still missing as of Tuesday.

According to that employee, supervisors never told the workers they could leave, even as the water started to rise outside.

On Wednesday, First Judicial District Attorney General Steve Finney confirmed the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation will investigate allegations involving Impact Plastics' leadership's actions during Friday's flooding.

"I asked that they review the occurrences of Friday, September 27, 2024, to identify any potential criminal violations," Finney said in the release.

The allegations referenced relate to whether, as water rapidly rose in a low-lying Erwin industrial park, the management of Impact Plastics didn't send employees home soon enough, gave them the impression they weren't free to leave, or specifically forbade them from leaving until it was too late.

The TBI confirmed its agents were "investigating allegations involving Impact Plastics" and referred all other questions to Finney's office, which said it would have no further comment until the investigation concludes.

'Supervisors didn’t tell us that we could go'

Impact Plastics employee Zinna Adkins stepped outside her workplace at 10:54 a.m. on Friday and captured water rising in the parking lot on her cell phone. But at that time, she said no supervisor informed employees they were free to leave.

“We were all talking to the supervisors and telling everybody, ‘Look, we don’t need to be here,'” Adkins recounted to WJHL. “Our phone alerts were saying we need to flee the areas. And they never said anything about it. And supervisors didn’t tell us that we could go.”

Adkins is among several employees who have asserted that they weren’t allowed to leave in time to avoid the storm’s impact. 

Adkins said that while she was never personally told not to leave, as a temporary employee, she didn’t feel she could abandon her job. By noon, with no power and floodwater nearly five feet high in the parking lot, Adkins said employees were told they could go home. But she said by then, it was too late.

“If it would have been any deeper, I wouldn’t want to walk through it. It was almost underneath my shoulders when I got through the parking lot,” Adkins said.

The raging waters swept 11 people away, and only five were rescued, according to a statement from Impact Plastics. Two of them are confirmed dead — part of a toll across six states that has surpassed 160.

In a statement to WJHL, Impact Plastics senior management offered “sympathy for the missing and deceased employees” but said, “employees were dismissed by management to return to their homes in time for them to escape the industrial park."

“Impact Plastics has not been contacted by the TBI yet but will fully cooperate with their investigation,” said company spokesperson Tony Treadway. He said Impact Plastics is preparing an internal review which it will release to the public.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.