During the week of December 9, 2012 there was an explosion of an air compressor at a North America smelter. Here is the story.
According to the vice president of operations for a North America smelter, an air compressor exploded inside of a small building that is used solely for support equipment. The building contained four compressors, one of which "failed". The explosion blew out one wall of the building and damaged several other walls.
There were no workers inside of the building at the time. But one worker was treated for a minor injury after being startled by the noise of the explosion. That worker was being treated for hearing related issues.
The vice president said officials are unsure what caused the compressor to explode, and the company will continue to look into the matter. In the meantime, production levels at the plant were unaffected by the incident. A back-up air compressor was being acquired to allow work to continue uninterrupted.
Occupational Health & Safety Administration has a pamphlet on Personal Protection Equipment (PPE) which includes hearing protection it can be viewed here: Here is an interesting document titled Occupational Noise Exposure it can be viewed here:
7 comments:
Its always great to read about the blood and gore of ALL your articles APSB. Try reading about the cooling tower explosion happened a while back...must be about 8-9 years ago now at the SHIN NITETSU plant in NAGOYA JAPAN< Now that was an explosion!! Rocked my house and we were living about 30 km`s away! I was one of the electricians at that point pulling the cooling tower apart. No one knew about the rusty piping underneath it. Kaboom...30 meter cooling tower blows its roof 500 meters to the south east. shockwave takes out the roofs on 5 nearby factories and luckily no one is dead. happened at 7pm, I was standing on it at 5pm. In other words....sometimes your just lucky but no matter if you were sitting in a tank you would still be blown to bits if your anywhere near something like that!
Thank you for the comments. We understand that the postings can be graphic. The point is not to sensationalize the incidents (if it appears that way we sincerely apologize). But it is the hope that by publicizing this incidents, maybe just maybe another plant will not have the same incident.
Thanks for keeping the topic of safety and the consequences going in the group.
Luckily, only one person was affected, and I hope that the hearing problems are not chronic.
I often am surprised that foundry workers operating our range of Automatic Grinding Machines are allowed by Management to use inadequate ear protection. This is despite clear warnings stating the type and rating of ear defenders on the machine itself and clear back up information. Reasons are generally that the operator complains of poor comfort.
Solution, work with operator to find a comfortable set, not allow the worker to use inadequate or no protection.
Happier worker, less time off station, better productivity, less cost, more profit.
Good safety is good business.
Thank you for the comments. Touring as many plants as the APSB does one sees that hearing protection is the least enforced personal protection equipment device. Hard hats, safety shoes, appropriate clothing are easy. Commonly, when you will observe someone putting in ear plugs and conversing with the tour guide. The guides commonly reply "you are screaming". Well that is because the person inserted the ear plugs in properly and the tour guides have not.
Thanks for the information. Safety is very important to all of us working in this business.
Thank you for the comments. The APSB agrees safety is very important to all of us working in the aluminium industry. 2012 was an especially a difficult year in the number of fatal incidents in our field. The APSB has counted over 30 aluminium workers were killed in 2012. One hopes that the number of fatalities in 2013 will be less than 2012.
Thanks for the informatiom. We will take lesson from this incident and modifie in the design. If possible can you share detail incident report with us.
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