How could it not have been inspected since '85 if they’ve been fined as recently as last year?
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/04/18/fertilizer-west-texas-epa-state-regulations/2094445/
Good question. The last OSHA inspection was 1985, to be more accurate. Who knows what’s happened since then, although I see no reason that they couldn’t have been fined some small amount without anyone actually looking at the place. This is Texas after all, where anyone who pays attention to what anyone else is doing is an evil socialist (I hear they’re hyperbolic too), so I doubt there was much serious inspection going on.
I don’t know if I’d be happier if I’m wrong and this happened even with frequent inspections, or if it could be prevented with the inspections that will be less and less frequent now that we’re slashing budgets left and right.
No kidding. Imagine living in one of the countries where this is a common occurrence with car bombs, drone strikes etc.
People are still looking into it:
http://www.hydrocarbonprocessing.com/Article/3193564/Latest-News/Experts-work-to-find-cause-of-Texas-fertilizer-blast.html
So it seems there’s 14 confirmed dead at this point. 
http://www.cnn.com/2013/04/19/us/texas-explosion/index.html