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November 12, 2010

Furnace explosion - take care of refractory lining

A news article mentions about a metal furnace explosion due to a liner failure causing severe burns to two persons. The article mentions the following:
"A Pennsylvania jury awarded $12.7 million to two men who were severely burned when a metal melting furnace exploded in 2003. The furnace explosion occurred when the liner failed, allowing molten metal to come into contact with a copper coil filled with ethylene-glycol and water. The resulting reaction caused the furnace to explode and spew hot liquid metal across the workplace".
Take care of your refractory lining in furnaces. In my earlier days as shift in charge in an ammonia plant, flames suddenly came out of a reformer furnace due to fallen refractory. It happened all of a sudden and the flames were close to naphtha fuel lines for the burners!We had to scramble to take action and avoid a catastrophe.
Read the article in this link

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