On November 18, 2024, Wynnewood Refinery surpassed two million consecutive work hours without a single lost-time safety incident — the longest such streak in the company's five-decade history. The milestone encompasses all on-site personnel including full-time employees, contract workers, maintenance crews, and construction teams working on the SAF expansion project.

For context, two million work hours is equivalent to approximately 1,000 employees working full-time for an entire year — without a single injury serious enough to require time away from work. In an industry where workers routinely handle high-temperature processes, high-pressure systems, and hazardous chemicals, this achievement reflects a safety culture that goes far beyond compliance.

"Safety isn't a program you implement. It's a culture you build, one shift at a time, one conversation at a time, one decision at a time."

The OSHA VPP Foundation

Wynnewood has held OSHA Voluntary Protection Program (VPP) Star status — the highest safety designation awarded by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration — since 2019. VPP Star sites operate with injury and illness rates at least 50 percent below their industry average, and they are subject to rigorous triennial re-evaluations that examine everything from management systems to frontline worker engagement.

But the VPP framework is only part of the story. What makes Wynnewood's safety performance distinctive is the depth to which safety thinking is embedded in daily operations. Every shift begins with a safety briefing. Every maintenance job requires a formal Job Safety Analysis. Every near-miss is investigated with the same rigor as an actual incident — because the near-misses are where you find the systemic vulnerabilities before they become injuries.

Behavioral Safety

Wynnewood's Behavioral Based Safety (BBS) observation program generates over 500 peer-to-peer safety observations per month. Operators observe colleagues during routine tasks, provide immediate feedback on safe and at-risk behaviors, and submit observation cards that are analyzed for trends. The program has been running for six years and has generated a dataset of over 35,000 observations — a remarkable resource for identifying behavioral patterns and proactively addressing emerging risks.

Looking Ahead

The two million hour milestone is a point of genuine pride, but the leadership team is careful not to let it breed complacency. In refinery safety, the moment you believe you've solved the problem is the moment you're most vulnerable. Wynnewood's goal is not a number — it's a culture where every person on site believes they have both the authority and the responsibility to stop work if something doesn't look right.