"worker has third degree burns on 25% of his body"

 

The Aluminum Association (USA) has collected data on molten metal explosions for over 40 years with their Molten Metal Incident Reporting Program. The report can be found here. This is an anonymous program where companies fill out a simple form after an explosion at their company. At the end of the year each company is provided with a detailed report listing a variety of factors regarding the explosions. This annual report is invaluable to many companies. They use the contents of the report to make their workplace safer. Here is an incident highlighting the danger of transfer operations.

 

Two workers at an aluminium remelting plant in Europe were seriously injured one day in January 2020 in an accident that took place at dawn at the company's facilities. Due to the significant burns produced by molten aluminum, both workers, were transferred to a local hospital, where they were admitted to the Burns Unit. As explained from this health center in a medical report, the largest of the workers has third degree burns in 25% of his body so his condition is "very serious", while his partner suffers third degree burns in the 3% of body surface, being its prognosis of "serious".

 

The accident occurred in the early hours of Monday, around 2:00 am. As explained from (local government safety organization), at the time of the events aluminum was being melted in a furnace, and it was during the movement of the transfer of this to the discharge line that an explosion occurred that reached the two workers present. From ((local government safety organization) they explained that these workers were alone at the time of the accident, so there are no witnesses to witness the events. Thus, it remains to be clarified what were the reasons that caused the fatal explosion that injured the two affected. Yesterday morning, technicians from the ((local government safety organization) visited the aluminium factory where the events took place, but from this entity they clarified that it will not be until today when the causes of the accident are predictably determined. Thus, (local government safety organization) technicians will return to the factory today to meet with security officials and the company itself.

 

We pray that the injured workers recover fully from their burns. Though this incident occurred earlier in the year we would expect that the workers recovered from their burns. We pray that there are no lasting affects from their burns. So let’s discuss their burns. 25% of the body means to us that the workers were not wearing proper PPE. There is simply no way around it that conclusion. Any worker near a furnace depending on their task should either be wearing primary clothing or secondary clothing. The news article states that the explosion occurred during the transfer. We wonder if the workers injured were using hand tools to help move the molten metal down the line. Explosions from hand tools is common. We teach workers that hand tool use and storage is very important. Hand tools should never, ever be placed on machinery, across troughs, touch the ground, etc. Why? Because explosions occur on a molecular level. In our plants chemical salts are commonplace. They are either tracked into our plants during the winter from road salt. Or they enter our plants through the use of fluxes. Either way, consider your concrete floors to be contaminated with salts. Any tooling that touches the flooring will receive salts. Salt attracts water naturally through hygroscopy. When that contaminated tooling is placed in molten metal (like a trough) an explosion can occur. The mass of molten metal that is discharged in an explosion can be sufficient to give a worker third degree burns over 25% of their body. Did it happen that way in this incident? We do not know, but we will ask. We pray that the company will tell us. We will update this story when new information is made available.

 

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