"suffered burns to his hands, feet and buttock...."

Annually the editors of the Aluminium Plant Safety Blog speak to thousands of workers on safety related topics. One topic is molten metal safety. We always, always talk about terminology first. Small explosions in our industry are commonly referred to as “pops” or “burps”. We hate those two words. Why? Because we find that both “pop” and “burp” has a humorous derivation or meaning. Our industry is filled with workers who have scars on their bodies from molten metal. We find nothing funny about a physical scar a worker has received while on the job. So, we have tried, and will continue to educate the industry that a “pop” and “burp” is actually a small explosion. An explosion is defined in our industry as the displacement of metal from its intended container. Commonly, when we make this soap box speech there is always, always workers in the audience who have the scars from molten metal burns. It is not funny or humorous when a worker is burned, if you agree then refer to explosions as explosions. Anything else downplays the seriousness of the hazard. Here is a recent story:

An employee of a business was rushed to local Medical Center one afternoon in November 2019 after he was burned with molten metal, police said. 

The victim, a 37-year-old man, was working at the smelting company around 12:45 p.m. when a furnace "burped," splashing liquid metal. The man suffered burns to his hands, feet and buttocks, police said.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration was notified and is investigating, police also said.

We pray that this worker recovers fully from his injuries. We were unfamiliar with the company and could not confirm if indeed the metal was aluminium or another alloy. Regardless, this incident screams to be posted here on the Aluminium Plant Safety Blog.

We can only assume that the news media quoted an employee from the company on the usage of “burp”. As we discussed (in great detail above) an explosion occurred at this plant. We also learn that the worker buttocks, or ass got burned in the explosion when contacted with molten metal. This is a very common injury in the foundry industry when workers where leather (or non-flammable) aprons. Which exposes their backsides. From our experience what commonly is determined afterwards is that there was a series of explosions. The first sprays the front of the worker with molten metal. The worker instinctively turns around exposing his back. Then another explosion occurs covering the worker’s backside with molten metal. Sadly it is a common injury. That is why when we talk to foundries we explain to them the dangers of wearing aprons around molten metal.

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