Explosion heard 21 miles away...one severely burned.

One of the most dramatic incidents that can occur in our workplaces is an explosion. Here is a recent incident involving an explosion:

There was an explosion one night during the week of March 12, 2023 at a manufacturing facility. The news media says the explosion happened around 9:45 p.m

The local Department of Public Safety told (news media) on scene that all employees are accounted for, and one was taken to the hospital with severe burn injuries.

"I did see clear signs of structural damage. The exterior walls of the building had actually exploded and...sent debris outward," said local Department of Public Safety sergeant told (news media) on scene. "You can see debris...that had been on the inside, was actually blown outside."

The flames are from the duct work that ignited.

“The walls of the building exploded and sent debris outward,” said Department of Public Safety sergeant. “Items that are normally stacked are spread around the floor and walls. The explosion did actually rupture a water sprinkler system pipes so we have water flowing.”

A neighbor captured video of Friday night's explosion, from 21 miles away, on her security camera.

"This is where they take large blocks of solid aluminum or magnesium, they melt it down in blast furnaces and then they use that liquid metal for the rest of the process," local Department of Public Safety sergeant said. "So this area has...tremendous heat." (The company) manufactures aluminum alloy wheels for the auto industry, according to its website

"One of the challenges we have with this type of fire is we cannot use water on liquid metal aluminum. Magnesium reacts violently with water," local Department of Public Safety sergeant explained. "It's not a traditional firefighting effort. We can't just put water on it and put it out, so we have to use dry chemicals or we have to remove the oxygen from the fire." The news media reported on a fire at the facility back in July 2020 when employees were evacuated after aluminum particles caught fire inside a furnace.

We pray that the injured worker recovers from their injuries. It is unknown what the root cause of the explosion was. This facility has had 2-3 dust fires over the past 20 months. With that said, news media stated that the explosion happened in the foundry department of the plant. So, we don’t know. Comparing the photos and injuries to past dust and furnace explosions we would tend to think that this was a furnace explosion and not a dust explosion. We acknowledge that the duct work containing dust ignited and burned. Regardless, we don’t know what had occurred. We will update this incident when we learn more information.

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