Homer J. Simpson, currently works in Sector 7-G as the Safety Inspector and has been with the company in some capacity since the birth of his first child Bart. He mostly works in a control room sitting in front of a T-437 Safety Command Console, but has little idea how to operate it (in one episode he was replaced by a chicken pecking at the buttons, and in another, by a brick tied with a rope to a lever on Homer's control panel). Often he just reclines in his chair, snoozing or eating donuts. Homer was appointed the safety inspector by Mr. Burns in season one after he lost his job as the plant's technical supervisor for driving an electric car into a steam pipe while waving to Bart, who is on a field trip. He frequently takes "leaves of absence" from (or flat-out quits) his job whenever something interesting comes up. This typically goes either unnoticed or without consequence by his superiors (although in one episode Homer claims he can't go back - "not the way I quit"). Smithers claims in "See Homer Run" that Homer pays a homeless man to fill in for him. Homer even had Mr. Burns fill in for him when he decided to cut out early though Mr. Burns pretty much did the same thing Homer does - sit back and relax. Although the safety of the plant—and Springfield—has been imperiled more than once on Homer's watch, he still keeps his job. Depictions of Homer's role in the plant vary. An early episode showed the safety job to be both an important job and Homer's ambition, and in You Only Move Twice, he is sought as the only senior employee apart from Burns and Smithers, suggesting a very flat hierarchy. In other depictions, Homer is the lowest-ranking person in the power plant org chart, subordinate to an Inanimate Carbon Rod, and additionally holds a record for longest time spent in an entry-level position. Homer is well known for his incompetence and stupidity in working at the plant, but various episodes suggest most of the other employees are just as bad: screaming and panicking at everything from meltdown alerts to fire drills; holding cockfights and chess matches instead of working; beating one another with chairs, drinking heavily, or simply crying at their desks; engaging in "Nap Time"; and even removing emergency procedure posters to make into get-well-soon cards (one of Lenny and Carl's worst violations). At one point he used an endangered manatee to cover for him eventually causing it to become severely dehydrated. One-time legal owner of Springfield Nuclear Power Plant after freeing the previous owner, Canary M. Burns from his cage. Homer, after being made the owner by Mr Burns, promptly fired him.
