More than two weeks after an accident killed 11 at the Nippon Dynawave Packaging mill in Longview, Washington, most of its idled workforce is still waiting to learn when they'll be back at the damaged plant.

Nippon Dynawave hasn't said when it will fully restart its liquid packaging mill, where more than 500 people made material for paper cups and other products before the May 26 spill of highly caustic liquid shut the facility down.

This week, the Japanese-owned company confirmed that some shipping activities had resumed, and a union spokesperson said a number of workers were back at the plant, with the remainder ready and available to come back when they're called."

But a company spokesperson cautioned that plant activity is largely limited to the shipment of materials that had already been produced before the May 26 accident, and that new production isn't underway.

"The company is shipping finished products that were manufactured before the incident, including packaging used by customers such as school lunch programs," company spokesperson Sam Jefferies said by text Thursday.

Nippon Dynawave, which is owned by Tokyo-based Nippon Paper Industries, has agreed to pay idled workers "at least" through Aug. 8.

Joshua Estes, spokesperson for the Association of Western Pulp and Paper Workers, said the union doesn't have the exact number of workers who have returned to work, and Jefferies also wasn't able to provide a figure.

The accident, which occurred when a storage tank failed and spilled tens of thousands of gallons of caustic "white liquor," is considered one of the state's most deadly industrial accidents.

It has shaken Longview, a community of around 38,000 that has been centered for decades on the timber and paper industries.

The 73-year-old plant, which Nippon Paper purchased from Weyerhaeuser in 2016, has been a major employer in its own right for decades, and also supplied raw material to another Longview employer.

Norpac, a maker of recycled paper products located next to Nippon Dynawave, purchased around 75,000 tons a year of so-called kraft slurry pulp from Nippon Dynawave, according to Packaging Dive, an industry publication.

Nippon Dynawave also provided Norpac with steam, water and effluent treatment, according to a statement Thursday from Norpac.

On Thursday, Nippon Dynawave said the company was supplying Norpac with some kraft slurry pulp that had already been produced prior to the incident.

In its statement Thursday, Norpac said the mill was "initially impacted" by the accident but "quickly resumed operations," and there was "no impact on NORPAC employees." It said its mill used Nippon pulp "for a subset of its graphic paper grades, but NORPAC is not dependent on Nippon pulp."

How long production will remain paused at Nippon Dynawave is far from clear.

Fastmarkets RISI, a forest products data company, thinks the pause "could last anywhere from a few weeks to six months, depending on the extent of damage, outcomes of various investigations and securing alternative chemical supplies," according to Packaging Dive.

Estes, with the union, said there were still "too many variables right now to be able to responsibly predict what that time frame looks like."

While the union remains "hopeful and optimistic that the site will get back up to full capacity … timing wise, it's still a big question mark."

In Thursday's statement, Nippon Dynawave said that "safety is full integrated into our ongoing approach."

In an unrelated incident at another Longview facility, a worker was injured Wednesday at the WestRock mill, according to an emailed statement from the Association of Western Pulp and Paper Workers.

The union said the injured worker had been transported to a hospital, but it "will not be commenting on the nature or extent of the injuries … out of respect for the individual and their family.

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