Dozens of dishes growing green mold. Live maggots and flies. Cockroaches creeping near trashcans.
Photos and video showing these nausea-inducing contaminants were sent earlier this month to a state watchdog agency on behalf of workers at an Inglewood facility where in-flight meals are cooked and packaged for several major airlines flying out of Los Angeles International Airport.
The complaint to the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health, or Cal/OSHA, alleges that the airline catering company, Flying Food Group, exposed workers to health hazards and unsanitary conditions inside facilities responsible for preparing thousands of airline meals at one of the nation’s busiest airports.
The union, Unite Here Local 11, which represents hotel and airport workers, says it’s just the latest example of workers operating under unsafe conditions at the facility, which services international airlines including Lufthansa, Air France, Singapore Airlines, Qantas, Virgin Atlantic and Air New Zealand.
The company, for its part, in a statement argued the union had put forth a “false and misleading” narrative amid years-long, “protracted and contentious negotiations,” and that the photos submitted to the state “do not accurately depict conditions” at the facility.
Flying Food Group vehemently denied the substance of the complaint, writing in its statement that “images were staged, manipulated, taken out of context, or otherwise presented in a manner that distorts their meaning.”
“We stand firmly behind our food safety and sanitation standards and will cooperate fully with any regulatory review,” the company said.
In the complaint involving the moldy food filed on Aug. 5, the employee, who identified herself at Thursday’s Los Angeles World Airports board meeting as Sonia Cerón, said she was told in late June to clean dishes in a cart that had been left unopened for a prolonged period.
In the cart, she “found dozens of dishes covered in decomposing, mold-covered food,” the complaint said. “Many of the dishes contained what appeared to be live maggots and flies, producing an overwhelming stench.”
Cerón suggested the dishes be tossed out, according to the complaint, but a supervisor told her they were needed for an upcoming flight. While handling the moldy dishes, she experienced “stomach pain, a headache and a strange sensation in her nose, which she believed was caused by inhaling the fuzzy mold,” the union’s complaint said.
The company did not provide protective equipment or a mask to reduce airborne risks, the complaint alleged.
Cerón has worked as a dishwasher at the company for about eight years.
Flying Food Group is a Chicago-based corporation that produces custom meals and snacks for airlines at major airports across the country — including in Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York City and D.C. metro areas — and operates 19 catering facilities across the United States, with one of its largest facilities in Inglewood.
In recent years, Unite Here Local 11 has filed numerous complaints over the Inglewood facility, claiming various wage and health issues, illustrating a bitter battle over movement at the bargaining table.
In 2023, workers accused the company of disrupting union activities, including implying workers could be dismissed for participating in a union protest and locking emergency exits on the day workers planned to picket outside. Cal/OSHA that year issued a $11,000 citation finding the company had failed to ensure exits were unobstructed.
In 2024, after conducting an investigation, the National Labor Relations Board found the company had unlawfully blocked a door, interrogated and intimidated employees about union activity, and fired at least one employee because of his involvement with the union. The company in March as part of a settlement admitted it had violated federal labor law when it hassled employees and agreed to pay $50,000 to the fired worker. It did not admit to blocking the door.
In 2024 and 2025, several women at Flying Food Group reported that they had been sexually harassed by a supervisor and later retaliated against for speaking out. Their complaints are pending with the California Civil Rights Department. Flying Food Group said it “strongly disputes” allegations of retaliation and said that it promptly investigated the claims and ultimately terminated the supervisor involved.
In February 2025, the company settled a class action lawsuit over wage violations for $510,000. Its on-site subcontractors were previously ordered by the city to award some $230,000 in back-pay to workers.
When reached for comment about Flying Food Group’s multiple labor complaints and violations sustained by state safety regulators, a LAWA spokesperson said in an email that Cal/OSHA would be responsible for adjudicating any health and safety violations and that LAX service providers are required to follow the law.
Flying Food Group workers have been unionized since 2016. Its most recent bargaining contract, covering some 700 workers, expired in 2022, and union leadership and company have been unable to reach an agreement on a new contract since then.
Union missives to city officials urging investigations of the company in the past had little success until earlier this year, when a small fire at the facility in January followed by worker testimony at city council meetings prompted scrutiny from the airport’s governing body, which launched a review of the company in February.
Elisa Valencia recalled that she had been gathering food scales, measuring cups and trays at the start of her shift when three cooks sprinted past her, shouting. She ran after them toward an exit she had never noticed before, but not before peering into the kitchen, where she saw flames curling up the wall by the stove, video footage of the fire reviewed by The Times shows.
Araceli Berzanes, a worker at the facility, said in an interview that she and her co-worker were assembling sandwiches in the facility’s cold storage room when the fire alarm went off. They tried to slide open the door they had entered from, she said, but it was held shut by a chain on the outside.
Cal/OSHA in May issued a $18,000 fine to the company for failing to maintain a door to the cold storage room that could be opened from the inside or signage warning against locking the door without first ensuring no one was inside. Flying Food Group spokesperson Angela Carrion said the company had filed an appeal.
Flying Food Group and others licensed to operate at LAX are bound by the airport board’s “contractor responsibility program” that seeks to ensure public funds are awarded only to capable and legally compliant contractors, and requires a pledge to uphold wage, safety and other labor laws.
The Los Angeles World Airports, the city body governing LAX and Van Nuys Airport, in a Feb. 17 letter notifying Flying Food Group that it would be reviewing allegations, reminded the company of its obligation to promptly report when any other government agency launches an investigation into its practices and said that allegations over the years “potentially call into question FFG’s trustworthiness, quality, fitness and capacity.”
The five-year licenses of Flying Food Group and scores of other airport vendors came up for renewal at the end of June, during a chaotic time for the airport authority.
LAWA has been scrutinized this year over its hefty $600,000 contract with a communications consultant who served as an unofficial advisor to Mayor Karen Bass even as he began working for Lineage Logistics, whose cold food stage facility in Boyle Heights burned in June. Meanwhile, an exclusive terminal for the rich and famous flying in and out of L.A. is embroiled in a messy business dispute, and the long-awaited electric “people mover” train expected to ease traffic at the airport ahead of the 2028 Olympics remains mired in technical hiccups, legal issues and financial uncertainty.
LAWA opted to extend Flying Food Group along with most other vendors for six months — a much shorter time period than is typical for operating licenses — but in its posted list did not mark Flying Food Group’s status as at risk or give any notice of ongoing investigation or noncompliance.
Airport officials did not respond to multiple requests for comment about the status of its Flying Food Group investigation.
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