KSHB 41 reporter Isabella Ledonne reports on stories in Overland Park, Johnson County and topics about government accountability. Share your story idea with Isabella.
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Safety regulators have fined a company in connection with violations in a deadly trench collapse last year in Kansas City, Kansas.
Around 2 p.m. on July 24, 2025, rescue crews from the Kansas City, Kansas, Fire Department raced to a worksite in the area of S. 16th Street and Metropolitan Avenue on reports that a worker was trapped in a trench being dug to lay fiber optic cables.
Nearly nine hours later, crews were finally able to locate the body of the worker, later identified as Francisco Rodriguez, 54, of KCK.
RELATED | 'It is not safe': BPU Water Department and UG flagged concerns 2 days before fatal trench collapse
According to a report finalized earlier this year, investigators with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration cited K&W Underground with three violations and issued total penalties of more than $66,000.
In one violation, investigators found the company did not provide a means of escape for workers in the trench that met regulations requiring a stairway, ladder, ramp, or “other safe means of egress” in trench excavations four feet or more in depth so that a worker requires no more than 25 feet of lateral travel to escape.
In the second violation, investigators say the company failed to provide protection to keep excavated materials or equipment at least two feet away from the edge of the excavations or by using sufficient retaining devices. Investigators noted that dirt that had been excavated from the trench had been placed into piles directly along the north and south edges of the trench. They concluded that the pile from the north side collapsed, engulfing Rodriguez.
In the third violation, inspectors say K&W Underground “failed to ensure that employees were protected from a trench collapse by utilizing a trench box, adequate shoring, sloping or benching as a means of protection.”
The report details that all three violations were present on July 24 and in the days prior to the collapse.
OSHA records reveal K&W was cited for the same types of violations in connection with an incident on Aug. 9, 2022, in Louisburg, Kansas. OSHA fined the company a total of $28,423 for four violations.
KSHB 41 News contacted K&W Underground Tuesday afternoon for a statement. This story will be updated if one is provided.
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