23 injured in flare-up at SAIL’s Burnpur plant | Business Line

23 injured in flare-up at SAIL’s Burnpur plant | Business Line


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Another pressure testing incident

A technician suffered serious injury during a pressure test when a thermowell failed and hit him in the leg. Read the incident in this link.

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Technology of the future today

World’s First Plant to Print Jet Engine Nozzles in Mass Production

What does the above link have with process safety? Technology is rapidly changing. Try to guess how 3D printing will influence process safety management.


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California Proposes Major Changes to Refinery Process Safety Management (PSM) Standard

California Proposes Major Changes to Refinery Process Safety Management (PSM) Standard



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Interaction with chemical engineering students

Today I gave a presentation on "Bhopal and it's relevance today -what young chemical engineers should know" to a group of 60 smart final year chemical engineering students in a leading university. My learnings from the interaction:
This generation of post bhopal chemical engineers are very curious to know what exactly happened at Bhopal and how they can use the learnings in their career in industry. If we do not pass on the relevance of the Bhopal disaster (and the learnings from Bhopal will remain relevant as long as the human being exists) to the present and future generations, we will continue to have major disasters in the Chemical industry. It would be nice if, during the students summer training in Industries, a topic on process safety is also mandatorily included.
The Management of Process safety should be taught as part of the core curriculum of undergrad chemical engineers. They will be the future decision makers in the industry.

I request Associations like the ICC and other chemical associations to take up the points mentioned above.
Also, every Responsible Care certified company may teach the lessons from Bhopal to chemical engineering students in at least three universities every year.


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Deaths Involving the Inadvertent Connection of Air-line Respirators to Inert Gas Supplies

Safety and Health Information Bulletins | Deaths Involving the Inadvertent Connection of Air-line Respirators to Inert Gas Supplies


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PRESENTATION TO BOARD OF DIRECTORS ON BHOPALS 30TH ANNIVERSARY

As you are aware, this year marks the 30th Anniversary of the Bhopal Gas Disaster. To commemorate the event, I am offering a 1 hour free presentation to boards of directors (including the Occupier and Finance Director) of any chemical manufacturing company on the topic "Are you in control of Process Safety"?
I will discuss all the current issues facing process safety and risk management in a chemical manufacturing  company and how directors can ensure effective risk management of a hazardous chemical facility.


If you are interested, please contact me at bkprism@gmail.com

My CV is given below:
I am a Chemical Engineer with over 35 years experience in the Industry in Operations, Technical Services and Process Safety. Prior to starting my Process safety consultancy in 2001, I had worked in India and Saudi Arabia.I have implemented risk based Process Safety Management systems based on best practices of OSHA CFR 1910.119 and others, in many plants in India and overseas. I have carried out many process hazard analysis studies and process safety related assignments in India, Germany, Greece, South Africa and the Middle East. I have also conducted many process incident investigations involving toxic gas releases, fires and explosions, runaway reactions, equipment failures, flare system explosions etc. You can contact me at bkprism@gmail.com


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Hazard of Potential Sidewalk Grate System Failure

Safety and Health Information Bulletins | Hazard of Potential Sidewalk Grate System Failure


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Hazards of overloading cable trays

Safety hazards of overloading cable trays -OSHA fact sheet


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22 wouldn’t have died in pipeline blast had GAIL installed safety features: Probe report :Indian Express

22 wouldn’t have died in pipeline blast had GAIL installed safety features: Probe report - See more in this link - Indian Express
Please also see comments by the papers readers, below the article.

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GAIL pipeline fire due to collective failure: Probe report | Business Line

GAIL pipeline fire due to collective failure: Probe report | Business Line

By the way, collective failure is not a term used in "root cause analysis".

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Ammonia leak in China plant sickens 33

An emission of unburnt ammonia from a flare due to a plant problem has led to ammonia release , causing 33 people to require treatment. Read about the incident in this link.


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Potentially Hazardous Amoebae Found in Eyewash Stations

Safety and Health Information Bulletins | Potentially Hazardous Amoebae Found in Eyewash Stations


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The boy who beeps - from GE

GE has brought out an interesting video on a young boy who can talk to machines by a beep! What does this have to do with process safety? You figure it out in this video.


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Root causes - Unveil them to prevent future incidents

Often, I see incident reports where it mentions the root causes of the incident, but actually they are not the root causes.
I am taking the example of a case study put up on the OISD website called Fire Incident in Process Cooling Tower
in which it mentions the following as "Root Causes" for the incident: My comments are given in brackets.

ROOT CAUSE

1. The reason for explosion and major fire is gushing out of entrapped hydrocarbon from the cooling water return header to new cell, which got ignited since hot jobs were being carried out in close vicinity. The ingress of hydrocarbon was from leakage of hydrocarbon in cooler/condenser in connected process units. (This is the direct cause of the incident)


2. Not adhering to the practice of stopping all work (especially hot work) and prohibiting all unrelated contractor and company personnel at site, before commissioning a new system/ facility. Also, carrying out hazard analysis/ risk assessment would have probably indicated that there could be trapped HC gas, and prompted commissioning/ operation team to vent out entrapped gases. (Why was the work not stopped before commissioning of a new facility? Why was hazard analysis/risk assessment not carried out?)

3. Failure to prevent commissioning activities, even though several jobs were unfinished:

· HC and H2S detectors were not installed.

· Instrument cabling, cooling fan jobs were still unfinished.

· Decision to go ahead with commissioning at fag end of the day.

· Improper coordination amongst Operation, Maintenance and Project  departments.

· Unable to ensure the gaps identified in internal safety audit & operation check-list are liquidated before commissioning

(Why was the commissioning done even though several jobs were unfinished?)


I am hoping the OISD will publish the detailed investigation report of the HPCL Visak cooling tower fire incident and the GAIL pipeline leak incident, just as they have put up the Mr MB Lall's committee report on the Jaipur oil depot fire on their website.

 
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Times of India: Nagaram blast: Probe nails GAIL, says it ignored disaster warnings

Times of India: Nagaram blast: Probe nails GAIL, says it ignored disaster warnings


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