Recall, closure ordered for TX Peanut Corp. plant

PLAINVIEW, Texas — Texas health officials shuttered a peanut plant operated by a company at the center of a national salmonella outbreak and ordered it to recall all products after inspectors found dead rodents, feces and feathers above a production area.

The Texas Department of Health and Human Services issued the order Thursday after finding a filth-infested crawl space at the Peanut Corp. of America plant. During an inspection Wednesday, officials also found that an air handling system was pulling debris from the crawl space into areas where dry roasted peanuts, peanut meal and granulated peanuts were processed.

The volume of products that would need to be pulled back was not immediately known. Many of the plant's customers — mostly manufacturers — had already begun holding products back or running their own tests.

The plant in the Panhandle city of Plainview, which employs about 30 people, must close indefinitely after operating unlicensed and uninspected for nearly four years since it opened in 2005.

Health department spokesman Doug McBride said it was up to Peanut Corp. to inform its clients of the recall, but it wasn't immediately clear if the company was complying. Phone messages seeking comment from the company weren't returned, and no information regarding the Texas action was posted on the company's site.

The Lynchburg, Va.-based Peanut Corp. is already under federal investigation in connection with the salmonella outbreak that has sickened 600 people and may have caused at least nine deaths nationwide. More than 2,000 possibly contaminated consumer products had already been recalled in one of the largest product recalls ever.

Federal investigators last month identified a Georgia peanut processing plant operated by Peanut Corp. as the source of the salmonella outbreak. The Plainview plant, run by Peanut Corp. subsidiary Plainview Peanut Co., had not had a state health inspection until after problems arose at the Georgia plant.

Officials at the Plainview plant had voluntarily stopped production Monday after initial lab tests showed likely salmonella contamination. Further testing was needed to confirm the results, but the health department said Thursday that its orders are not contingent on finding salmonella.

Calls to the home listed as the residence of the plant manager went unanswered late Thursday. No one answered the door.

David W. Evans, executive director of the Hale County Industrial Foundation, said the company was lured to the area with tax breaks and incentives for maintaining an employee quota. He said that quota wasn't met.