Bloomberg Audio Studios Podcasts Radio news.
Christy was in her early 50s when she left her native Honduras for the U.S. she told Bloomberg's Julia Love
that she didn't have authorization to work in the US but after a few months searching for work,
she took a job as a cleaner on a construction site in Texas in 2021.
Texas is hot.
This site was very exposed to the sun and the elements,
especially in the early days, and she had to walk long distances.
She was logging up to 30,000 steps a day.
Christy is her first name.
She asked that Bloomberg withhold her last name for fear of reprisal.
She said she worked 12 hour shifts vacuuming, mopping floors and scrubbing toilets.
In the summer heat, the temperatures reached up to 98 degrees.
And even though there were water stations, she says her bosses discouraged workers from using them.
They discouraged that because they didn't want workers to lose time using the restroom.
And so as a result, workers were struggling to stay properly hydrated.
One day, Christy was vacuuming a staircase to clear dust and debris.
Christy says the area wasn't ventilated.
She was sweating heavily.
The vacuum she'd been given had a short tube, so she was bending over to reach the ground.
The last thing she remembers was standing up and everything going dark.