FLORIDA. A Burger King at 32375 US Hwy 19 N in Palm Harbor drew seven high-severity violations during a recent state inspection, the worst single-location performance among Florida Burger King restaurants in the 90-day window ending August 18, 2026.
Those seven violations included toxic chemicals improperly stored or labeled, failure to follow parasite destruction procedures, food contact surfaces not properly cleaned or sanitized, and improper use of time as a public health control. Inspectors also cited the Palm Harbor location for improper hand and arm washing technique, no consumer advisory for raw or undercooked foods, and failure to follow required procedures for specialized processes.
That is a wide range of failures for a single visit at a fast food restaurant that does not advertise raw fish or cured meats on its menu.
The Worst Locations
Six locations each accumulated five high-severity violations during the same 90-day period. Burger King #7299 at 16025 S Dixie Hwy in Miami was cited for inadequate shell stock identification, parasite destruction failures, improperly cleaned food contact surfaces, no consumer advisory for raw or undercooked foods, and toxic chemicals improperly stored or labeled. Inspectors also found single-use items being reused.
Burger King #28769 at 16130 NW US Hwy 441 in Alachua drew five high-severity violations including an employee not reporting symptoms of illness, inadequate shell stock identification, and toxic chemicals improperly stored, in addition to food contact surface and consumer advisory failures.
The Burger King at 11834 E Colonial Dr in Orlando was cited for improper handwashing technique, food in poor condition or mislabeled, no consumer advisory, and two separate chemical violations: toxic chemicals improperly stored or labeled, and toxic substances improperly identified, stored, or used.
Burger King #7257 at 1093 US 301 in Baldwin had food in poor condition, parasite destruction failures, improperly cleaned food contact surfaces, no consumer advisory, and toxic chemicals improperly stored. Multi-use utensils not properly cleaned added an intermediate violation to that list.
Burger King #9162 at 1007 NW 21 Ct in Chiefland carried the most total violations of any location in the group: five high-severity and three intermediate. Among the high-severity findings was a citation for the person in charge not being present or not performing duties, alongside an employee illness reporting failure, improperly cleaned food contact surfaces, no consumer advisory, and toxic chemical storage violations. Inspectors also flagged inadequate cooling and cold holding equipment, single-use items being reused, and inadequate ventilation.
The Burger King at 4704 Babcock St in Palm Bay was cited for an employee not reporting illness symptoms, food from an unapproved or unknown source, improperly cleaned food contact surfaces, and two chemical violations.
Burger King #5313 at 3770 Ulmerton Rd in Clearwater and Burger King #23620 at 5024 N US Hwy 41 in Apollo Beach each drew four high-severity violations. Both were cited for employee illness reporting failures and improperly cleaned food contact surfaces.
Burger King #2328 at 2801 SW 27 Ave in Miami rounded out the ten worst locations with four high-severity violations including food from an unapproved source, inadequate shell stock records, no consumer advisory, and toxic chemical storage failures, plus three intermediate violations.
What These Violations Mean
The single most common high-severity violation across these ten locations was improperly cleaned or sanitized food contact surfaces, cited at seven of the ten. Cutting boards, prep tables, and grill surfaces that are not properly sanitized between uses become direct transfer points for bacteria including Salmonella and E. coli. At a burger chain where raw beef contacts surfaces repeatedly throughout a shift, that failure is not a paperwork issue.
Toxic chemicals improperly stored or labeled appeared at eight of the ten locations, making it the most widespread violation in this dataset. When cleaning agents or sanitizers are stored near food or in unlabeled containers, the risk is acute poisoning through direct contamination, not a theoretical future harm. The Orlando and Palm Bay locations each drew two separate chemical violations, one for storage and labeling, one for improper identification and use.
Employee illness reporting failures appeared at five locations: Alachua, Chiefland, Palm Bay, Clearwater, and Apollo Beach. Norovirus is the leading cause of multi-victim foodborne illness outbreaks in the United States, and it spreads almost entirely through food workers who continue working while sick. A failure to report is not a paperwork gap. It is the mechanism by which a single sick employee becomes an outbreak affecting dozens of customers.
The parasite destruction citations at Palm Harbor, Miami on S Dixie, Baldwin, and Apollo Beach are worth pausing on. Parasite destruction procedures require specific freezing temperatures or cooking protocols to kill organisms including Anisakis in fish and Trichinella in pork. The consumer advisory violation, cited at nine of the ten locations, compounds this: customers who might otherwise choose to avoid undercooked items have no posted notice that any item on the menu carries that risk.
The Longer Record
Burger King operates 429 locations in Florida, and state records show 7,199 inspections on file across the chain. That volume of inspection history means the statewide average of 4.27 violations per inspection and an 87.41 percent pass rate are not snapshots. They are a pattern built across thousands of visits.
No emergency closures have been recorded for Florida Burger King locations so far in 2026. That is a meaningful data point. None of the ten locations flagged in this report were shut down. Inspectors documented high-severity violations and moved on.
The Chiefland location at 1007 NW 21 Ct stands out for the breadth of its failures. Eight total violations, including a citation for the person in charge not being present or not performing duties, suggest a management gap rather than isolated lapses. CDC data cited in the inspection records indicates that establishments without active managerial control have three times as many critical violations as those with engaged management on site.
The two Miami locations tell a specific story. Both Burger King #7299 on S Dixie Hwy and Burger King #2328 on SW 27 Ave were cited for inadequate shell stock identification records. Shellfish traceability violations at a fast food burger chain raise an immediate question about what shellfish is being served and where it is coming from. Without proper tagging records, there is no way to trace a shellfish-related illness back to its source.
The Palm Bay location on Babcock St was cited for food from an unapproved or unknown source, the same category that appeared at the SW 27 Ave Miami location. Food from unapproved sources bypasses USDA and FDA safety inspections entirely. At a chain with centralized supply infrastructure, that violation is harder to explain away as a local oversight.
The Pattern Across Locations
Nine of the ten worst-performing locations in this 90-day window were cited for the no consumer advisory violation. At a chain that does not advertise raw or lightly cooked menu items, the persistence of that citation across locations from Palm Harbor to Miami to Alachua to Baldwin suggests a systemic gap in posted disclosures, not a series of unrelated local failures.
The Palm Harbor location's seven high-severity violations remain the most concentrated finding in this dataset. Among them: parasite destruction procedures not followed, toxic chemicals improperly stored, food contact surfaces not properly cleaned, and failure to follow required procedures for specialized processes. What specialized processes are being performed at a fast food location on US Hwy 19 in Palm Harbor is a question the inspection record does not answer.
