An interesting incident is mentioned by Stephen P. Andrew, T. Kim Parnell, Robert Caligiuri, Lawrence Eiselstein of Parnell Engineering and consulting:
"A process upset at a chlorine production facility resulted in a release that forced the partial evacuation of a nearby town. Investigations revealed that the events commenced with the failure of a shell and tube heat exchanger used to condense chlorine gas. Post-incident inspections revealed a cloth at the liquefier coolant inlet that accelerated the flow in that region, causing certain tubes to be breached. As a result, the water-based brine liquefier coolant was entrained in the chlorine process stream, forming a highly acidic oxidizing mixture. This corrosive mixture then flowed to the chlorine storage tanks destroying an elbow in the tank inlet piping and rendering the tank shut-off tank valve ineffective, thus allowing chlorine to vent into the atmosphere".
Read the detailed report in this link.
June 5, 2011
June 3, 2011
Tank explosion in refinery
An incident in a refinery in the UK has reportedly killed 4 persons. The Telegraph reports the following:
"Four people were killed yesterday evening when a 730 cubic metre storage tank exploded in what appears to have been a tragic industrial accident.This is the first serious accident at the plant. Previous incidents include a small fire caused by a hydrogen leak in 2001 and two fires in 2003 in which no one was seriously injured.John Davies, leader of Pembrokeshire Council, praised the refinery's safety record saying: “I have known it all my life and this is first time as far as I am aware that a life has been lost in similar circumstances. It has an exceptional (safety) record.”
The refinery is one of the largest in western Europe, employing 1,400 people".
Read the article and see the video of the tank and spokespersons comments in this link We have to wait for the investigation to see why this happened.
See some photos of the explosion in this link.
Read the article and see the video of the tank and spokespersons comments in this link We have to wait for the investigation to see why this happened.
See some photos of the explosion in this link.
Understand the basics of chemical safety while managing change
The International Program on chemical safety has a good basic write up on chemical safety - corrosive materials, incompatibilities, materials of constructions, storage and effects of chemicals on concrete. Many times, we tend to forget the basics when managing change, that later results in an incident.
Read the article in this link.
Read the article in this link.
Labels:
Managing change,
Process design
June 1, 2011
Welder killed in accident
A regulator of a gas cylinder apparently malfunctioned and came out, killing a welder on the spot at an accident in a factory in Odisha. Times of India reports the following:
"In the accident, Rawat`s leg flew 50 m away from the spot, while the palm of his left hand is still missing, Ponda sub-divisional fire officer Parab said. Quoting the factory officials, Parab said that the blast was the result of a broken knob of a gas cylinder with which Rawat was cutting metal sheets at the Kundaim-based iron plant. "As the cylinder's knob was broken, the force of the gas centered around the knob and moved out with a tremendous force that caused the blast," Parab said."
Treat your gas cylinders and their fittings with respect. I keep observing scant disregard for the handling and safe usage of gas cylinders at many sites. Read the article in this link.
"In the accident, Rawat`s leg flew 50 m away from the spot, while the palm of his left hand is still missing, Ponda sub-divisional fire officer Parab said. Quoting the factory officials, Parab said that the blast was the result of a broken knob of a gas cylinder with which Rawat was cutting metal sheets at the Kundaim-based iron plant. "As the cylinder's knob was broken, the force of the gas centered around the knob and moved out with a tremendous force that caused the blast," Parab said."
Treat your gas cylinders and their fittings with respect. I keep observing scant disregard for the handling and safe usage of gas cylinders at many sites. Read the article in this link.
Process safety and metrics - don't get lulled into a false sense of security!
There has been a lot of discussion on how to make process safety management work and new initiatives like risk based PSM and others have been suggested. These include metrics for tracking of process safety performance. The old adage " what cannot be measured cannot be managed" is true for process safety, too. However, I observe a stark difference between metrics for measuring PSM performance and UNDERSTANDING that measurement. In many of today's chemical companies, the board of directors often do not have a person competent to analyze the PSM metric that is being displayed. With the net result that the number being displayed is just that - a number. For example, if a metric that is being displayed to the board is the pending items from a process safety audit, the actual number may be less but its severity may be very high. What is the solution? There is only one answer - the board of directors of chemical manufacturing companies should ensure that there is someone competent to analyse the PSM metrics for them.