Details sketchy on accident that took life of Libby native

Federal authorities are investigating the death of 20-year-old Libby native Tyler Challinor, a Fort Simcoe Job Corps student who was crushed last week by a tractor he was working on at Yakama Forest Products.

At last word early this week, the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration was trying to obtain a search warrant before entering the mill’s property, which is on Yakama Nation tribal land in White Swan, Wash.

Meanwhile, grieving family members say they haven’t been able to get much information from authorities or the mill about the Jan. 7 accident that killed the muscular 6-foot-8 Challinor.

“It’s been really, really weird that nobody knows anything, that it has not been reported, that it has not been in the news,” said Challinor’s mother, Shanda Jennings, of Libby. “It’s been a complete media whiteout.”

Challinor was working under the tractor sometime before 5 p.m. last Thursday, when one of its hydraulic cylinders failed, causing its large loading bucket to fall on him, said Yakima County Deputy Coroner Marshall Slight.

“He was basically deceased at the scene,” said Yakima County Coroner Jack Hawkins. “This man was crushed.”

Challinor had just completed his mechanics program at Job Corps and was working at the mill while waiting to enter an advanced mechanics school in Utah, his mother said.

Challinor was lured to the area by Job Corps, a cost-free program administered by the U.S. Department of Labor that provides job skills to 16- to 24-year-olds.

It houses most of its roughly 220 students in dorms at the school situated just west of White Swan.

Jennings said she’s had trouble getting details about the incident from the federally run Job Corps, the mill or Yakama tribal police, who are investigating the incident.

Officials with both the mill and Job Corps, which trains students in heavy equipment mechanics and other vocations, refused to divulge any information about the incident Monday.

The mill, which is operated by the Yakama Nation, told OSHA investigators that they would first have to obtain a search warrant before entering the tribal property, said OSHA Area Director David Baker in Bellevue, Wash.

“All I know at this point is that an employee was working at that facility, and a piece of equipment failed and it collapsed on him and crushed him,” Baker said Monday. “That’s all I know. We’re working with the tribe to gain entry.”

Because the Yakama Nation is a sovereign tribal government and not bound by state regulations, OSHA has investigative authority.

Tribal police chief Ken Hoptowit directed all calls about the incident to Yakama Tribal Council chairman Ralph Sampson Jr., who did not return phone calls Monday seeking comment.

Jennings said she wasn’t able talk to anyone from Job Corps about the incident until Saturday, two days after it happened.

Challinor’s father, Greg Challinor, who for years has been separated from Jennings, was notified of the incident by the mill’s safety manager about two hours after it happened, she said.

He lives in Idaho and was driving to Montana on Monday, she added.

“This has been a total nightmare,” she said. “It’s just such a mystery how nobody can get anywhere and nothing has been released. It’s just like it totally didn’t happen, nobody is talking about it.”

Jennings said another man who was also working on the tractor with her son suffered minor injuries in the accident. She said she learned that he was treated and released from a hospital.

She said she would like to contact him, but the school hasn’t provided her with his information.

Challinor took the brunt of the blow when the loader collapsed, his mother guessed.

“He was my only son, my baby even though he was 6-foot-8,” she said. “He was just a big teddy bear.”

Jennings said she last saw her son on Christmas.

“You don’t ever expect that that’s the last time you’re going to see your kid,” she said.

(Phil Ferolito is a reporter for the Yakima Herald-Republic.)