Seattle, WA (WorkersCompensation.com) – The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration has ordered an Alaska aviation company to pay years of back wages, $100,000 in compensatory damages, and to reinstate a pilot who had been suspended, then fired and ostracized among the close-knit industry for reporting safety concerns at work.

Bald Mountain Air Services violated federal whistleblower laws with its actions against the employee in 2012. With 35-years of aviation experience, the pilot for the Homer-based company raised repeated safety concerns at work ranging from missed drug tests for pilots to poor recordkeeping.

“Voicing safety concerns at work should never cost someone their job,” said OSHA Acting Regional Administrator Galen Blanton. “This employee should be hired back, compensated and treated fairly from here on out.”

OSHA’s order requires Bald Mountain Air Services to:

• Pay the employee back wages at the rate of $350 per day from November 2012 until he receives a bona fide offer of reinstatement.
• Pay the employee $100,000 in compensatory damages for pain, suffering and mental distress.
• Expunge his employment records of any reference to the exercise of his rights under federal whistleblower law, and any reference to the adverse actions taken against him.
• Not retaliate or discriminate against him in any manner, nor convey to a third party any mention of the employee’s protected activity.
• Respondent…