A U.S. Chemical Safety Board go-team has not yet been able to access the portion of DuPont’s La Porte, Texas chemical plant where a release of methyl mercaptan killed four workers early Saturday morning.
A seven person go-team from the U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) begins work this morning at the LaPorte DuPont plant near Houston, trying to determine what caused the toxic chemical leak that killed four workers and sent another to the hospital early Sunday morning.
“Telltale signs” of microbial activity were found by investigators in a storage tank that exploded earlier this year, killing a contract worker and severely injuring another. The July 28 incident at the the Omega Protein facility in Moss Point, Mississippi involved hot work being done on or near a tank containing eight inches of a slurry of water and fish matter known as “stickwater,” which was thought to be nonhazardous.
Organic Dust Fire and Explosion: Massachusetts (3 killed, 9 injured). In February 1999, a deadly fire and explosion occurred in a foundry in Massachusetts. OSHA and state and local officials conducted a joint investigation of this incident.
The U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) is demanding access to the Tesoro refinery in Martinez, California, in order to investigate a Feb. 12 chemical spill that resulted in first- and second-degree burns to two workers.
NDK Crystal received special exemption from state of Illinois
November 18, 2013
An explosion which occurred December 7, 2009, at the NDK Crystal manufacturing company in Belvidere, Illinois, fatally injuring a truck driver at a nearby gas station on the Illinois Tollway, resulted from corrosion in the walls of a pressure vessel, which went uninspected for years. The U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) released those findings last week in a draft investigation report.
Company “repeatedly” failed to apply safer design principles
April 16, 2013
Missed opportunities to apply inherently safer design, failure to identify and evaluate damage mechanism hazards, and the lack of effective safeguards culminated in the vapor cloud release and massive fire that occurred at the Chevron refinery on August 6, 2012,a draft report by the U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) has found.