Clark County firefighters conducting safety drills at The Boring Company's Las Vegas tunnels suffered chemical burns that left permanent scars, but the company escaped $425,595 in fines after a controversial intervention by Elon Musk's lieutenant. The incident highlights growing safety concerns around Musk's underground transportation project and raises questions about regulatory capture.
The chemical burns were just the beginning of what would become a regulatory controversy that exposes the intersection of Musk's empire and government oversight. Clark County firefighters arrived at The Boring Company's Vegas tunnel site for what should have been routine emergency drills. Instead, they walked into pools of caustic muck that mixed groundwater and dirt with concrete accelerants used to harden tunnel walls.
The firefighters weren't warned about the hazard. Their boots filled with the chemical soup, burning their legs and leaving permanent scars that required hospital treatment. According to Fortune's detailed investigation, this wasn't an isolated incident - Boring Company employees have been suffering similar burns for years.
Nevada OSHA responded predictably, launching an investigation and slapping the company with three "willful" citations in May - the agency's most serious classification. The proposed $425,595 fine reflected the severity of exposing first responders to undisclosed chemical hazards. But then the normal regulatory process went completely off the rails.
The same day the citations were issued, Boring Company president Steve Davis picked up the phone and called Nevada's Governor's office. Davis isn't just any executive - he's one of Musk's most trusted lieutenants and co-leads the billionaire's Department of Government Efficiency initiative. The call connected him with the governor's state infrastructure lead, who happened to be a former Tesla employee.
Within 24 hours, high-level Nevada officials were sitting across from Davis and Boring Company representatives in what former OSHA officials called "a highly unusual break from the normal citation-and-appeals process." The meeting worked exactly as intended - Nevada OSHA withdrew all citations and fines.
The regulatory capture didn't stop there. Documents show Nevada OSHA failed to properly record the citation withdrawal, an admission the agency made to Fortune. Even more damning, someone altered case files to remove evidence of the meeting with the Governor's office. Only after Fortune pointed out the suspicious edit was the meeting information restored to the record.
