HPCL VISAK REFINERY FIRE INCIDENT INVESTIGATION

An investigation of the cooling tower explosion in HPCL Visak refinery by the joint chief  inspector of factories suggests that "HPCL failed to adopt safety steps"
Read the article in Times of India in this link.

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Implementing PSM - do not overdo it!

I often get RFQ's for PSM implementation some of which writes down everything under the earth!
Recently I got one that included occupational health, off the job safety, and customers and products! All these mentioned items are part of the basic necessities BEFORE PSM is implemented. So if you have a doubt in your basic safety do not implement PSM till you get your house in order!



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Explosion incident

"On May 8, 2005, a crew of three, a painter , an attendant and a supervisor were in the process of applying a paint/liner product on the interior of a rail tank car in an enclosed shop. The painter was inside the tank car and the attendant was standing on top of the railcar at the manhole. The supervisor had just stepped into his office when a loud explosion occurred. Flammable vapors had accumulated in the tank car and the shop.The attendant was blown from the top of the rail car to the floor of the shop but was basically unharmed' Read details in this link..

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Safety rating for chemical plants: A step in right direction | Business Standard

Safety rating for chemical plants: A step in right direction | Business Standard

Contribute to the surviving victims of Bhopal by buying my book "Practical Process Safety Management"

Accidents in the lab and process safety

 A recent fatal accident at a lab in a Chemical Plant in the UK highlights the need to understand that process safety also needs to be taken care of in the lab. Some sources are attributing the explosion was caused by the exposure of trimethylindium, a pyrophoric chemical, to the air.
Read more in this link
In another incident in 2008, a 23 year old Chemistry research student died form burn injuries during a lab experiment. A detailed explanation of the incident is given in this link. 

Personnel working in Labs and R & D's need to exercise the same caution, if not more, as they may be working with certain chemicals which may behave differently under different conditions.Process safety should start from the lab....



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One dead in LPG road tanker blast

 A LPG road tanker driver died in Mathura when his tanker met with an accident while allegedly avoiding cops who were demanding bribes. Read the news article in this link

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Simple properties of chemicals and process safety

The newspapers are full of reports of a dry ice explosion in a restroom in LA international airport. Dry ice or solid CO2 has a property of directly changing into gas from its solid state as it's temperature increases. If the dry ice is kept in an enclosed container, then it exerts immense pressure and can explode the container. The discovery channel has a video in this link which demonstrates vividly what can happen. Worth a see by all plant operators to realise the hazards of chemicals.


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Safety rating system for chemical units

The ministry of chemicals and fertilisers have published the draft safety rating system for chemical plants on their website for public comments. Give your comments to them by October end. You can access the draft rating system in this link. See the file in "important links" as well as "updates" scrolling on their website.


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Where does your reactor rupture disc vent?

An accident in a reactor caused a rupture disc to burst open and spew the reactor contents out, killing people. Very often, people think that just by installing a rupture disc, a reactor is safe. You need to properly design the outlet system of a rupture disc. Read about the incident in this link.

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Ammonia transfer line incident

An incident of ammonia release has been reported in the USA when apparently a pressure safety valve malfunctioned. Check your safety valves in transfer lines - where do the PSV's release?  Are they tested regularly? Many times, tranfer lines are always in use and operations do not find the opportunity to release them for maintenance.

Read about the incident in this link.

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Ruptured reboiler caused fire?

A company news release about the explosion at their Geismar plant indicates the following:

"According to the preliminary findings three main factors in combination with one another contributed to the incident:

>      The unexpected presence of liquid hydrocarbons in the reboiler in standby mode

>      The introduction of heat into this standby reboiler

>      The pressure relief system was isolated from the reboiler which was in standby mode"

Read the news release in this link.

It is heartening to see this news release on the company's website itself. In India, we are still waiting news about the investigation about the cooling tower explosion in a refinery!!

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"This is your pilot sleeping"

A recent incident in a British airline where both the pilot and copilot dosed off because of lack of adequate sleep in the previous nights highlights the importance of fatigue management in the chemical industry, too. While the chance of a control room operator in a common control room in a chemical unit to fall asleep unnoticed is less, fatigue often impairs judgement and reaction. For plants using process simulators for training, it is worth to take the trainee through a series of night shift training sessions so that he himself feels the difference.
Read about the incident in this link.

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Emergency exits

Thanks to Mr Salim Akthar for sharing news about a fatality in a cement plant where a person died due to lack of proper emergency egress. The incident occurred when the persons went to attend to a cement extraction problem in a silo.  As the choke suddenly cleared, the victim panicked and it appears that while trying to escape from the exit staircase his forehead struck against some equipment / obstruction on the way. He died due to the impact. This incident highlights the importance of emergency exits while performing non routine jobs.


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Possible dust explosion during hot work

Thanks to Sujith for sending information on a possible dust explosion in a tank storing HDPE in Korea, during welding work. The news article in the Korea Joongang Daily mentions:
"The sudden and massive blast hit the plant, located at the Yeosu Industrial Complex, at around 9 p.m. Thursday, catching workers engaged in welding off guard, some falling 30 meters (98.4 feet) down from the tank to the ground, according to witness accounts.
The death toll is likely to rise as five of the 11 wounded are reportedly severely burned. Firefighters contained the fire within 10 minutes after the blast.
The plant, owned by Daelim Industrial, was undergoing maintenance work at the time.
Workers were welding a door into the tank to make an entrance so the company could send inspectors in to examine the interior, the company said. 
“We checked if there was remaining gas in the tank every time workers were put to work, thus multiple times a day,” said an official with Daelim’s public relations team, who requested anonymity.
“Each time, the result was zero. There was no gas lingering in the tank and thus that was not what caused the explosion.” 

Read the article in this link.


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Hot work accidents

We keep hearing about hot work accidents and loss of life. They are totally preventable and we need to apply basic precautions. See a powerpoint on welding cutting and brazing in this link.

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State of preparedness for chemical emergencies

A news report in the Times of India indicates that are 380 "Major Accident Hazard" (MAH) prone industrial units, of which 331are operational in Gujarat.  It also mentions that toxic chemicals with more than 5,000 MT tonnes storages in Gujarat are acrylonitrile, ammonia, benzene, chlorobenzene, chloroform, cyclohexanone, ethylene dichloride, hydrogen, cyanide, P-xylene, styrene monomer and toluene. The report specifies the gaps in infrastructure required for chemical emergency preparedness. Read the report in this link.

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Inherent safety and LOPA

A Chemical Engineering friend of mine (Vijay) who has about 35 years of experience in Process Industry wrote in to say this:

"Participated in a LOPA study involving pyrophoric materials. However, what struck me was people failed to understand intrinsic safe and unsafe. They did not grasp that giving high SIL rank and spending lot more on SIL certified instrumentation does not buy any increased safety from accidents that can occur when a pyrophoric material is handled. Only a process change can make things safer, not SIL certification or LOPA for inherently unsafe processes. This also happens to be the message of Fukushima. But people dont get it".

There is a strong lesson in his message!!
 
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HPCL refinery fire death toll increases to 27

The latest figure indicates 27 people have died till now in the HPCL cooling tower fire. I feel very sad when newpaper articles mention the death toll, also mention that only one HPCL employee was killed in the incident. A life is a life whether it is a contract worker or employee.
I am waiting for any news about the investigation. Any one know anything about the investigation findings?

Novel solution to flange leaks due to thermal expansion

Often, flanges leak due to the thermal expansion difference between the flange material and the fasteners.  An interesting article by a company that deals with such leaks. Read the article in this link.
PS: This is for information only.

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Another confined space fatality due to nitrogen

On 18th May an engineer in a refinery in Iran died when he entered a vessel filled with nitrogen. Time and again we keep hearing about deaths due to nitrogen. What are you doing to raise awareness of your employees about the hazards of nitrogen?
Read this article in EHS today.


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