There is one exception, the heroic efforts of Arkema Chemical when their peroxide facility got flooded by Hurricane Harvey. This was a company that had multiple layers of protection against problems, but in the end, despite extraordinary efforts by the management and staff, nature won. A nasty fire but no deaths or serious injuries.
There's also "unadviseable shit in a remote location lead to some sort of lemmings level death domino's and now three dudes and somebody's spouse are dead because dude #1 decided not to use X safety equipment and the alarm for thing A was offline, and then dude #2 went in to rescue dude #1 and also died from the unavoidable thing so dude #3- so on and so forth" and "we forgot rust and corrosion is a thing and now someone is dead, even tho Dan warned us 4 months ago something was off"
@@JayPersing - Don't forget about the classic: "Stickers are *so* expensive! We'd go bankrupt if we had to label our barrels and pipes of extremely-reactive chemicals *multiple* times! That's literally redundant!"
@@wolfumz Not in the short term, safety is a long term investment that's hard to quantify.. A fire inspector told that everybody loves a firefighter, nobody like the fire prevention guy.
@@flyingmerkel6 That's a great phrase about the fire prevention guy, I'm going to remember that one, thank you. Yes, in a sane system, safety is definitely an investment with good returns. These chemical companies, though, like many other companies in American, are only worried about _this_ _quarter's_ profits. An investment that's going to pay off slowly over many years? There's just no financial incentive to make that kind of move. Worse, if you spend a bunch of time/money on safety, and your competitor doesn't, he now has more time/money to out-produce you. It's the same reason R&D departments totally disappeared in this country. You'll be run out of business overnight if you stick your neck out and think long term.
@Samuel SkalaBasically what they've done with health and safety regulations in New Zealand. Management staff are personally responsible for incidents due to their negligence, and can face massive fines and imprisonment.
@Kelly Andrews No, they WOULD know and would ignore them because they are beholden to the stockholders who want as much money as possible. Companies HAVE TO be on a leash so short that the very moment they do something wrong, they'll start chocking. That is the only way that things will be safe for workers.
@Kelly Andrews it is their business to know especially after the first accident. If they try to claim that the company is too big for the senior management to operate the company safely either they should immediately be removed from their positions or the company broken up.
Never happen, it's a British company, B.P. killed 11 men on the deep water horizon, and their two company men responsible were charged and walked away Scot free. Have dealt with these scumbags in the oil patch for years.
When they say stuff like; “it was thought that during this time the worker closed the valve” you already know the worker either parted or they suffered severe injuries to where they couldn’t talk or were mentally impaired and it’s just heartbreaking.
Of all the CSB videos, I think this is the one that makes me the most frustrated based on just how things were allowed to be for so long, and how obvious the danger.
welcome to having supervisors that KNOW what needs to be done, but want to outproduce the other shifts and housekeeping and dust litigation is "that pussy shit, get back to work". It gets even worse when the dust collector vacuums dont work.
Its the South. The businesses own the republicans that gut regulation and enforcement. The workers vote for them because of social wedge issues. Its a huge clusterfuck.
People who run their business like this need to go to jail, for a long time. They value profit over human life, and the result you get is dead and injured people for a few extra pennies. But instead of real consequences, these companies get a slap on the wrist, and keep operating the same way, because it's cheaper for them to pay small fines when something goes wrong, then it is to provide proper maintenance and safety features.
Having been born in the UK and moved the fuck away from it I guarantee you they don't. The culture there is just a mess of thinking they're better than everyone else. Mention any country to an englishman and he'll start listing reasons why england is better than it.
Could say the same thing about America. Are you new to youtube? Anybody says anything against America & it's followed by "What shit hole backwards country are you from?" comments.
Problem is? The people who are most likely to be killed or injured as employees are the very people who vote for politicians that limit safety regulations.
FOUR INCHES OF IRON DUST... my GOD! How could you walk into this place as a manager and not feel sick! Absolutely shameless. Thanks to the USCSB, anyone watching should feel good about giving the deuces and walking out of a nightmare like this.
In the food and beverage industry, we take lots of precautions to prevent the buildup of dust like this. You need to install structural members at 45 degrees, with no flat surfaces. You also use special devices called explosion arresters on your powder bins. Their powder shouldn't be moved by open air conveyors, they should be using pneumatic piping. This type of system would be sealed, and very little dust would get out.
The tragedy is that there's still a ton of people who think standards and regulation are there to cause them grief, instead of curb destructive ignorance.
in 2020.... listening to the USA vice-presidental debate. Mike Pence BRAGGING that Trump has repealed a lot of regulations... in the name of business... what a fool.
@@phxcppdvlazi The truth is usually somewhere in the middle. There are definitely regulations that are ridiculous and don't really make sense. Many people will agree about this. The problem is that even if a regulation is not useful and very cumbersome, it is not easy to remove or modify it. So hopefully they were focusing on those low impact, highly imcumbering regulations. That being said, the company in this video should be shut down until it follows the correct regulations. All companies should follow safety regulations. It is up to oversight committees and the government to do their due diligence!
@@phxcppdvlazi Government regulations are horrible things when misused. There are an abundance of unnecessary regulations that overburden small businesses and cause many to fail. Small businesses often need many people hired full-time just to read and comply with all of the extra regulations. Regulations are a often a tool used by the government to control the market. It drives away competition (which is the key to low prices and high quality) and creates artificial entrenchments of massive corporations.
It's amazing people assume their company has safety protocols in place, when working at a plant, cover your own ass, and if it looks sketchy, dont do it and find a new job
Secondary dust explosions are far more hazardous than the primary explosion. It shows to go that house keeping is more than "shine & show", and is integral part of overall risk management.
I hate that they said that "house keeping is ineffective" if you gotta do it 4 times a day, maybe your equipment needs updating. Those employees needs some training too, if you get a gas leak, always assume the worst turn it off god damn it.
Housekeeping seems to be easy pickins for placing blame after industrial incidents/accidents. If you keep the material in the controlled process to start with, then housekeeping won't ever become an issue. That's heirarchy of controls 101.
@@odustbrown1836 Yep, it should be the last line of defense; if dust accumulation even significantly reaches Housekeeping then the plant should be shut down until the stuff's fixed!
@@h8GW I'm hoping they changed something in the last ten years. At least bought a cherry picker and a snow shovel or something. "Hey Bert, put this on," "Bob that's a fireman's suit- how did you even-?" " my cousin Vinny is a fireman- anyway put it on" "why?" "Welp, im gonna give you this here snow shovel and then you're gonna go sit in the cherry picker while Mike drives you around, and you're gonna push all the dust off the rafters with the snow shovel so we don't blow up" "this is a terrible idea... change the filters on the HVAC, you owe me a beer" " I'll buy you a shot of vodka after this! Seriously tho put on the fire suit" "what the fuck, Bob"
Similar happened in my shop. An electrical contractor was working on an overhead breaker box. He used an air hose to blow off inches of carbon fiber dust that had accumulated over years of matching composite structures in that area. When he closed the circuit breakers there was a localized flash fire/explosion that blew him off the ladder. He was not seriously burned or injured but it could have been much, much worse. We swept and vacuumed that area until it was spotless.
I was working in a drywall factory and 2 maintenance workers opened a dust collector without making sure it was empty first. The entire factory building became engulfed in a dust cloud. The building was evacuated because you couldn't breathe in there. I told the plant safety manager that we should get everyone away from the building because of the risk of combustion (I was also a safety man but for the contractor company that was out there providing millwright services) he dismissed the warning because "FGD isn't flammable". About 2 minutes later there was a sound like the burner on a gas stove igniting and a puff of flame out of the open maintenance bay door. No one was injured, but I can only imagine if someone had been standing near that door.
I worked in the steel industry in the 90’s, we built plants and plant facilities all over North America. There.were piles of steel dust everywhere. Any flat surface in the plants would be coved in a pile of dust. I had no idea of this danger.
To be fair, in most of the steel industry the accumulated dust is mostly oxides which pose no risk of burning. This facility is an exception as they work with powdered metals.
Was gonna say its different because its an alloy. Iron dust itself is combustible but with steel you mix it with Nickel, Chromium and stuff which makes it a lot safer but yea clean up your work area....
I'm surprised that nobody thought of collecting it -- not even from a safety standpoint, just from an economic one. Is recovering all that metal really not worth the relatively small expense of collecting it?
I just started watching these, I am a student at Oregon state university, a chemical engineering student, I didn't need previous experience for a dust cloud to scare the shit out of me. Seriously, anyone who's seen mythbusters know that any dust is combustible. Not flammable. Combustible.
Canada has the same problem but they did pass laws with more teeth in 2004 because incidents were just seen as a cost of business. Now, if a company, manager or owner knowingly endangers an employee it is a criminal code offense and they can serve jail time and be personally fined. They also gave site inspectors more power. They can completely shut down a site for unsafe practices, revoke permits, and inspectors can show up unannounced. I think the USA needs to look at similar laws.
Corey absolutely. Those laws seem like common sense to me. Also asbestos can be safely used in some situations. Hell, carbon fiber can be worse than asbestos.
Opto Phobe the current mood is “the answer is deregulation, what’s the question?” Hilariously and tragically, many of the regulatory rollbacks don’t even seriously effect production or profits. They just endanger workers and the environment
5:34 - "But the CSB found that housekeeping at Hoeganaes was ineffective." More like, "housekeeping was non-existent." I'm sure most people that worked there considered cleaning up dust to be "menial" work or assumed someone else would do it.
Ever worked retail? Yeah even if you give a damn, you'll be laughed at and disciplined for doing more than the bare minimum amount of work 9 outta 10 of the time. I'm hardly surprised no one who worked there did it.
In a production environment like this, I would imagine that housekeeping was something tacked on to the worker's daily tasks without any room being made in their schedules to accommodate. Basically "Here's the list of work you need to accomplish during the day and it'll take you your entire shift, but try to get in some housekeeping when you can" I highly doubt they had any dedicated or even semi-dedicated housekeeping staff outside of the offices.
Tennessee, say no more! Foreign companies love the Right To Work southern states and lax regulations and enforcement. I worked at coal fired power plant 15 year's and this kind of dust build up was not accepted by hourly and management ever!!! They were asking for it and got it!!! Unfortunately somebody paid will Thier lives, good job SMH
At the factory I worked at we'd shut everything down once a month at least and clean/maintenance machines. In the long run I imagine that saved them a lot of money cause we'd find problems with the machines before they went critical and stopped production unscheduled. Having a clean work environment makes it easier to identify problems and makes the day way more tolerable.
I really like these videos, its like the history channel but its all the best parts. Really like these videos, went from a random video about delta p, the fact changes in water pressure can suck you into a pool filter/dam/ anything that has to do with cleaning a blockage under water and make you drown/die a horrific death, to these videos describing just how scary it is working in industrial plants. Love your videos, and hope you guys spread the word about how and what not to do.
on the bright side, if the place were to get leveled by a big explosion, the corporation can build a new, updated building that's up to standards. apparently they don't mind the smaller bursts, as well as practice little to no maintenance/cleaning.
They probably think that insurance + workers compensation is cheaper than having effective measures in place. Bastards. If my kid would die in a fire in that plant, I would avenge myself on the owners. They just don't give a shit.
The hydrogen explosion would probably have leveled the place, except the iron powder that fell during and after that explosion wasn't confined and also thoroughly mixed with air. Had it been, the whole dust cloud would have burned all at once with an immense blast. The only thing that saved them was that conditions were not quite right. So they only got burning falling clouds of dust. It's hard to believe but that is better than what could have happened.
@@LatitudeSky They were fortunate in that while iron happily oxidizes spontaneously, it's very hard to ignite unless you increase the surface area tremendously (by powdering it). If this had been a sugar plant.. well. the CSB has a report about a sugar plant blowing up to a dust explosion too. It was far worse.
An excellent video on combustible dust. The 2007 OSHA Combustible dust standard was imposed at my facility by management shortly after the rules were written. Many, including myself were skeptical on the hazard. Lesson learned!
@@baloog8 Yes, but I'm sure that the exposure to iron fine particulates illustrated here would cause quite a bit of respiratory system accumulation; that causes serious respiratory issues.
I once got to tour a paper products place and I have doubts that place would ever go up. its dust control was amazing, With filtration units easily the size of a bus.
The corporatocracy would rather invest in moving production over to a less regulated and litigious country than update their standards and practices. In China, this video is probably just called Tuesday.
b1aflatoxin Thanks to Trump and Republicans we're rolling back safety standards so that Americans can be the victims of industrial accidents. Make America Die Again.
I work in a uk joinery company and the amount of dust collected by random parts of structure is worrying. Its mdf, chipboard, and wood dust. I make sure to keep the machines clean, and our extractor is also pretty good, but i have asked the managers to have a more stout approach to housekeeping
@@Daydreaminginmono Do you wear a dust mask at work? One of granddad's was a carpenter and died of lung failure because all all the saw dust he'd breathed in over the years, a bit like coal lung.
@@CynicalOldDwarf Yes mate i do. Im A cnc operator so i get by without most of the time. But if i notice a lot of dust i will mask up. Our extractor is new and very powerful so its not as bad. I did cut one material called “Autex” which is recycled bottle caps, that stuff makes my windpipe itch so mask all the time with that.
I'm glad the general consensus in the comments is that of disgust towards the company. It's a shame the combustible dust legislation was only a guideline at the time of the accidents, but I'm glad it's regulated now. We should all spare a moment for the families & their frustrations as they would be immense.
Is there a specific OSHA regulation and standard for combustible dust? I can't find it on their page. It has always been covered under the general "employer shall provide a safe workplace" provision but as you can see here you can kill 5 people the same way and only get fined $123,000. That was the proposed fine from the state OSHA. They appealed it so no idea what they actually paid. Only fine I can find on the fed OSHA for them is in 2017. A worker suffered an arc flash while repairing a motor on, wait for it, the bag house. Cost them $7,350. Even if they had to pay the full $123,000 that would be a bargain compared to what it would cost to clean that place. Before anyone blames this on Trump that fine was proposed while Obama was pres.
This is an excellent video (as area all of CSB's videos). It's sad to see only 65k views on something that should probably be required viewing for all industrial engineers before they graduate! These types of videos should be integrated into manager training programs and facility operator training programs whenever there is such a hazard present.
The problem isn't the lack of interest by the engineers. It's that for the company it's more costly to be safe than simply absorb the occasional fines. The death are collateral damage
I think the CSB has pushed huge worldwide progress with the videos on combusible dust (iron/sugar/wood). Workers worldwide know a clean workplace is important, but they don’t know why and can’t argue without arguments. Making the argument available to consumers through RUclips from the CSB, educates general audiences on one of the unexpected yet most widespread hazards.
"The CSB continues to recommend against stick-welding against filled propane tanks inside the oxygen tent". Maybe the CSB needs to start using some stronger language.
I work at a plant that bleaches, dyes, prints, and finishes fabric. Lint build-up is a problem, even with our vacuum systems in place. At the end of each week, when operators shut their machines down, they are supposed to blow them down with water and/or air to get any loose lint and either swept up or flushed down the drain. Occasionally, we end up with operators who fail to clean for several weeks on end, which results in fires that flash up pretty quickly but then burn out just as quick. The usual culprits are younger guys who've barely been there a few months bitching about not being paid enough to clean. Thankfully, all it takes to convince them otherwise is giving them a choice between dealing with dust or dealing with a baby-momma giving them an earful for losing another job. They typically pick the former.
In 2017 I was doing an LED lighting upgrade in Ashville NC, in a complex that used to be a fabric manufacturer for Gildan clothing. There were electrical junction boxes and other conduit parts that were literally so packed with lint we at first thought a mouse must've built a nest somehow. But soon found almost every box we opened up was cram-packed with this lint. The electrician said he never seen anything like that before.
@@at0mix197 I feel your pain. Much love for both Carolinas in which I've lived for many years, but Bubba and LaQueefa are clueless about safety so much so they're difficult to keep on-mission.
The work of the good people at CSB. Anyone net heeding their recommendations should be held personally accountable, starting from the Congress down to shop mangers.
If lives hadn't been lost I'd be saying that the amount of dust build-up shown in those pictures and videos is absolutely hilarious. There is enough dust in that place to set off a nuclear-sized explosion that would've left nothing but a crater where the plant used to be if it had all ignited at the same time. I wonder if that company realizes how unbelievably lucky they were to ONLY lose five workers to fatal dust explosions? I have NEVER seen that much dust piled on absolutely EVERYTHING in a factory before. Frankly I am shocked that the CSB people even had the cojones to take those pics. When I saw 37 inches of dust piled on absolutely everything in sight, I would've been out of that place faster than an Olympic sprinter could've made it to the exit.
i wouldn't go that far. OSHA is the agency that is actually supposed to enforce these findings and most of the time they don't do shit-all, because they're bought off.
You here the bad because rich scumbags pay for you to hear the bad. Business is the enemy of good government and ONLY good government can protect the public.
I have, I worked for two companies that lacked job safety,and oaha did nothing but warn when they would be coming out to do inspection's. And at the millwright company(Industrial Maintenance Inc.) they was actually working at Debruce grain elevator south of Wichita,Ks when it blew up. Cause "grain dust accumulation" never found fault of the explosion but the company I worked for (not at the time of the explosion Thank GOD) but my uncle was one of the Foreman's with the outside contractor's and he said dust was piled up four inches and even deeper in some places. Working around grain elevators since I was 16 i have my gueeses what happened but whats important is osha did nothing until it blew up and then they fined all the contractor companies and fined DeBruce. At the other company I worked at we filed a grievance with ohsa over poor air quality and for our trouble they fired us. And worthless osha did their investigation and not once did they interview us. Filed their report and swept it under the rug. And in unemployment court we proved without any shadow of a doubt that the reason our company claimed they fired us was a lie. And because we didn't have money to get a lawyer we was left with only our unemployment wages. You my friend must either work or know someone who works for ohsa,or your just ignorant. This government (which is what ohsa is an agency of) does absolutely nothing for workers safety unless there is an accident then they come out with their greedy little hands out, pretending their doing their jobs. But you go ahead and believe your lying worthless government, I just Pray you or anybody else doesn't have to die to see what Evil lurks in the world. Sorry so long of a comment but it really peeves me off to see posts like this one. And I'm not sure who said good government but there is no such thing. Pathetic, You must be blind
How to solve this problem: 1. Take photograph of beam with dust on it. The one at 9:30 will do nicely. 2. Get a whisk broom, a dustpan and a plastic bag, and carefully sweep all the dust from that beam into the bag. 3. Weigh the bag on a quality scale and record the weight on a scale ticket. 4. Get a copy of the company's price list. Find whatever that metal is, and highlight the price per pound. Multiply the weight by the price and write that on the scale ticket. 5. Request an audience with the plant manager. Start the meeting with this statement: "Sir, I know how we can make about a half-million dollars a year in almost pure profit and reduce our insurance premiums, and it will cost us next to nothing." Show the manager all the evidence you have. Then explain that all that metal dust is just lost profits. Unlike Imperial Sugar. where the wasted sugar has to be thrown away, the metal dust that collects on the plant walls and framing can be thrown back in the process, cleaned and sold. These guys may not listen to appeals to worker safety or plant integrity, but wave huge amounts of cash in their faces and they will listen.
I work for the company that vacuums up the collected iron powder in that plant. Whatever is vacuumed up goes into a vacuum truck and is ultimately put back through the process, nothing is wasted. When First Response first took over the cleaning operation at that facility, this was after the incident in 2011 and before I started working for First Response, I'd heard they had 20+ vacuum trucks on station, running 24 hours a day. Today, there are just two, one for each building.
I've heard of at least one metallurgical powder manufacturer that re-vamped their facilities to include dust-resistant surfaces, and a multi-million dollar dust collection system that not only removes the accumulative airborne particles, but separates the iron components for re-use in the powder manufacturing process...
As the CSB is staffed by profesionals in their fields it should have the power to stop where it finds danger to life and limb and OK work to commence when the situation has been rectified to CSB's satisfaction. Does a dead worker have less priority than keeping a plant running?
the CSB just investigates. it's up to OSHA to actually do anything, and as other people mentioned, OSHA keeps getting their budget cut and pressured by industry lobbyists.
Almost anything with a high enough surface area to volume ratio is STUPID flammable. Things like ash and sand are obviously exempt from this rule, but metals and plastics and wood are absurdly flammable as dust. I've made a mini flamethrower with an air compressor and flour. It's a little scary
@@LegendLength Think of iron rusting. That's oxidation/combustion, and it actually releases a little bit of heat, but because it's so slow, it's unnoticeable. It's very slow because the surface area to volume ratio of a solid is very small, whereas it's huge in a dust. So the iron dust is just rusting, but very quickly. Old style hand warmers worked the same way I believe, rusting iron filings to make heat
@@altaccount4697 Even a small cabinetmaking in a small farm school near my area has a decent wood dust collecting system for the heavy machinery. Not only because it is flammable, but because of the risk of accidentally ingesting the dust that can ruin our inner bodies after a long while. And of course we pass the broom when the period ends. This company has no excuse.
@@bouteilledeau1463 my school's woodshop spent thousands on a dust collector for exactly those reasons. This was purely human error, not wanting to install proper precautions, and what do you know, saving money on safety never saves you money.
Why was this plant not shutdown? When you have so much dust that the fires cause workers to completely disappear into thin air, that's clearly too much dust.
Many years ago, I’d worked in shops with metal dust all over the place. I didn’t know what it was and just thought the shop was dirty. Now I know it wasn’t “dirty”, it was a tinder box.
Laws with teeth need to be passed and people need to go to jail when they grossly violate those laws. I would like to think that these industries would be able to self-govern themselves but it is obvious that they cannot.
+ktrez2000. "laws with teeth" mean nothing if the people tasked with enforcing them are bought and paid for. however there is one thing that is better than money for motivating politicians... the threat of a massive uprising.
The fines should be percentages of a company’s profit so that huge companies don’t ignore them because they’re so small and small businesses don’t get demolished.
Kerbalnaught; You should really change that to uncontrolled dust. I work for a manufacturer of forged metal products and some of the processes do produce metal dust, but there is an adequate dust recovery program (my employer has no use for metal dust, but scrap metal recyclers will buy the stuff). Along with the dust recovery system, there are fire extinguishers rated against powdered metal fires where such fires might occur. The amusing irony is that the facility did have a powdered metal fire when sparks from welding were drawn into the dust recovery system. There were no injuries (we got lucky) and the new dust recovery bag house was constructed where another fire of that kind would threaten no nearby work cell. Of course, I am typing this from Canada. After the Westray mining disaster, when it was found that there were no penalties that were appropriate for the level of safety violations causing multiple deaths, the federal criminal and labour laws were amended to allow employers to be charged with negligent homicide. Now that having workers killed on the job can get the employer, or officers of the employer, a life sentence, workplace safety is a big deal in Canada.
I must have watched this at least 40 times. Presented this with Hebrew subtitles to a couple of my customers as part of Safety training ( metal fabrication industry ). I get choked up every single time.
I live near this plant, and I was so sickened and upset when news of this accident happened. I had quit a dangerous job 4 months before in KY and moved to TN to get away from the horrible memories I had of coworkers being killed and injured from a dust explosion at a charcoal plant. My feelings of survivors remorse were brought to an all time high with the news of this tragedy. That company should be destroyed by lawsuits.
Not only did they not shut down; but to this very day (8 years later) only 54% of the CSB's recommendations have been addressed by the company. Source: www.csb.gov/hoeganaes-corporation-fatal-flash-fires/
@@x3wildcard That 54% is the number of CSB's recommendations in connection to this case (made to ANY organisation) that have been closed. They only made *4* recommendations *to the Hoeganaes corporation*, and *NONE* of those have been closed. So, you mean "only 0%", not "only 54%".
@@TheCarson116 That's all recommendations made in relation to the case, not the recommendations made *to the Hoeganaes corporation* . Click "View All" under "Recommendations" on the site, and you'll see 0/4 for the corporation.
Something to think about: thermite is a mixture of iron oxide and metallic aluminum. when ignited, the oxygen atom is pulled from the iron and bonded to the aluminum, becoming hot enough to melt the entire mixture. this is how rail tracks are typically welded. While it's the aluminum that is burning in this case, it's not hard to imagine that similar amount of energy being produced in an aerosol. also, a flint and steel works by using flint to shave off bits of iron. these freshly made shavings have clean, oxidized surfaces, and so rapidly combust. tiny as they are, that small amount of oxidation is enough to turn the sparks yellow hot. Imagine that, but as a dense cloud all around you. TL;DR metal is hard to burn, but when it does, they put off a crazy amount of heat.
I worked in a manufacturing plant next to a feed mill. Some of our dry ingredients came from that feed mill and as a supervisor I had to go in the feed mill occasionally. The amount of dust and aerosolized dust terrified me.
I agree. The problem is that most tradesman and general workers haven't received that training. If the company doesn't provide the training, and you get hired to work there, how would you know? I worked for a company that used silica fire brick for building furnaces. The silica dust accumulated everywhere, not unlike this video. The people there said 'oh it's just like the stuff on a beach.' Then I found out a number of people were no longer there, because they had gotten cancer and died, including the guy I replaced. I got sick with silicosis. I was out of work for 4 weeks and still have scarred lungs from an incident there. I looked into it and found out that coal mines are shut down when they drill into a vein of sand. Plasterers come in and seal off the vein with cement, to prevent worker exposure. In a coal mine! I quit shortly after. That company is still in business, however.
Fun fact: They had to pay the amazing fine of $80,000 for one of the explosions that killed three people. How they can keep the lights on after that kind of punishment is amazing.
i sanded a small mountain bike spring for an hour in my garage with the door open and there was metal dust in my nose for 24 hours after, i can’t imagine how much dust is in these workers bodies
It’s not always the executives fault. Even though much of the time it is. It’s best to identify the person who is actually responsible and prosecute them. Especially owners. If you owned stock in this company then technically you were an owner, but how can you be responsible?
I was a truck driver for a while and visited many a production and warehouse facility and more often than not was appalled by the condition of many facilities I visited
California and much of Europe have pretty strict safety regulations and they still seem to be able to compete pretty well in the world's markets. These simple safety measures (e.g. plain old housekeeping) aren't nearly as expensive as they've tricked you into believing.
This is a constant problem in a number of industries including coal mining, textiles, sand, and wood. Dust is both a health hazard and fire hazard. Also these constant threats of if you don't like it go work elsewhere or we can always move somewhere the workers won't be as picky about safety and health. Most of these accidents are preventable however companies will have to accept lower profits. When they claim they can't compete that means that they could be making higher profits not that their is any real price difference in the market between a product produced in China or the US.
The irony is that the dust is not an unintended consequence of a manufacturing process, it is the product! All of that dust in that facility was unpackaged product. Proper dust control measures would have paid for themselves in improved plant efficiencies. One of the root causes of all of the described accidents is management not understanding the opportunity cost of not shipping all of the product uselessly piled up in their plant.
That may or may not be true in this business and others. Nevertheless dust is always a problem in industries where dust is created. It can be a slip and fall hazard or an explosive hazard. Management doesn't like to halt production when dust collection equipment needs repair.
Dirty filthy place, a daily hazard to workers' lungs even without the explosion risk. If they are never going to give a ratsass for worker safety over production and profit then they need to realize the money lost with tons of wasted product floating around their facilities which could be reclaimed and put back in the production line.
Ive been obsessed watching these channels where it recreates work place accidents.. I found a couple that are excellant. I think this is important to use as a point of reference and a way humans can learn to not repeat the same mistakes. However its tragic people have to lose there lives for improper maintenance etc.
When someone tries to claim that safety reglations are an unnecessary burden on industry, send them links to a few CSB videos. Keep up the good work CSB!
One issue with the NFPA codes is that they do not require existing facilities to retrofit to the new codes every time they change them, only for new facilities to be built within the specs of the new codes. Ideally OSHA should have shut the facility down after the first incident occurred, allowing them only to reopen after passing a good housekeeping inspection with a random follow-up. This could have prevented the rest of the following incidents.
Long before these accidents a friend of mine worked for a major supplier for machinery at this plant. Some of the bad things he told me about that place made me not want to be close to it.
OK, So I live in Europe. I don't know about all the in and outs of US workplace safety regulations, but am I right in saying that CSB only make recommendations and are not able to carry out enforcement? I've watched a fair few of these videos in the last week and I'm shocked. You guys in the US do, to be fair, have a hell of a lot of heavy industry, but the accident rate seems to be huge compared with in the EU. In the UK the last industrial explosion with major loss of life was about 5 years ago if memory serves (a wood dust explosion). Prior to that it was probably the buncefield refinery fire ten years before, which killed nobody. The Gallatin scenario would just never happen here. If the plant wasn't up to standards it would never be cleared to operate. If maintainence was not carried out to standards it would be picked up in inspection and shut down. After the first accident the Health and Safety Executive would have inspected and shut the plant down until remedial work could be carried out. Prosecutions would have ensued. We had a lot of major disasters in the 80's, until we got a grip. Before the Grenfell Tower fire the last ones almost faded into memory. It is amazing to me that this sort of thing keeps happening. Write your Congressman!
To be fair, the U.S. is a bigger place, meaning that there are more industrial buildings and facilities out there, meaning that there's a higher chance that at least one of them in a given time will have an accident, for one reason or another. Though that doesn't mean that our regulations are good. The CSB mainly investigates and makes recommendations, OSHA is the ones who are supposed to be enforcing and creating regulations, but do a crap job of actually enforcing, and both OSHA and the CSB are facing potential budget cuts (from what I heard) because of lobbying companies wanting less regulations on how to run shit safely, and because of other politics, which I think one of the things that's fueling the want for deregulation of the industry is because the industries in the U.S. has to compete with the industries in China, which have next to no regulations, and thus can make stuff cheaper than places here in the U.S.
Writing to Congress doesn't do anything unless you attach about $10k to that letter. We still have an entire city here with poisoned water. On top of a lot of states being right to hire, if you get sick or injured off the clock you can be fired and replaced like a cog.
Actually, no. I didn't miss that. This happened under the regulatory system in the US though. Foreign owned companies operating in the US operate under the same rules as US owned companies. To do otherwise would leave them at a competitive disadvantage, so market forces force a rush to the minimum allowable standards. In the EU there are laws that apply across EU member territories for this reason - no European nation can gain a competitive advantage by undercutting the safety standards of their neighbors. I would hope that moral businesses would operate to the highest standards whatever the legislative space they operate in, however this is obviously going to place them at a disadvantage when operating in a regulatory environment that holds life in such poor regard. In Europe these sort of accidents are very rare these days. In the US they are not. If you really want to look at accidents caused by foreign companies operating outside their home territories have a look at Bhopal and Piper Alpha.
Our congressmen are bought and paid for by the ultra wealthy who own these plants. The plant owners don't want safety enforcement because it interferes with production (profits) and their risk/reward calculations say it is more profitable to have an unsafe plant that causes damage, loss of life, legal settlements, fines and penalties, etc. etc. than it is to make the plants actually safe. This is so because there is no incentive (criminal liability/accountability, brought on by laws and their respective law enforcement agencies) for these owners to do it. If it becomes cheaper to actually make a plant safe, they will. But rest assured, it'll never happen, not while human greed is running rampant and unchecked by deregulation and an inability for agencies to enforce the rules they set forth.
Grain dust is highly explosive. I did a temp job for a week or two at a granary, and they made me watch training videos showing big concrete grain silos with massive holes blown out of them. My job was to go around the plant sweeping up the grain dust. After my temp position ended, they didn't take me back.
Besides the chance of dust combusting, imagine breathing that dust for 40 plus hours a week. Can’t say for sure but I bet the life expectancy after retirement won’t be very long.
Its something people dont think about. I currently work as a safety professional in the oil and gas industry, but i have worked safety and industrial rescue in many different industries. Combustible dust is a huge issue, especially metal. Think about the melting point of a metal. Well that same metal will burn even hotter than its melting point. Certain metals can even become Pyrophoric if the "dust" is made of small enough particals, for example aluminum, it is extremely energetic, and burns at over 3000°F (1700°C). Being engulfed in a flash fire that hot would instantly cause fatal burns. Iron powered burns even hotter than that. The flame front also moves through the dust cloud at such a high speed that it propagates into a blast wave (explosion) like a fuel air explosive (thermobaric bomb). In other words it can make for a really, really bad day.
This is also a MAJOR failure of regulators. The moment the flammable dust buildup was documented after the first incident the whole plant should have been shut down. Here in Califonria my uncle used to work in fire safety and inspection. The marshal could close a business so fast your head would spin for a serious violation.
The CSB is an investigative organization, and they are not allowed to shut down plants. They may, though, bring this to the attention of people who do have that power and that is what they do through these videos.
How many accidents Did that company have to have in order for somebody to step in and close them down For safety updates in right now it sounds like multiple government agencies failed
These videos are very informative. The loss of life and injury is awful. For those interested, search for Paul O’Neill Alcoa. This man changed the culture at Alcoa and made safety the #1 priority at that company.
There are 2 types of USCSB videos
- Valve fail at Exxon's refinery
- Doom's day fire massacre
There is one exception, the heroic efforts of Arkema Chemical when their peroxide facility got flooded by Hurricane Harvey. This was a company that had multiple layers of protection against problems, but in the end, despite extraordinary efforts by the management and staff, nature won. A nasty fire but no deaths or serious injuries.
There's also "unadviseable shit in a remote location lead to some sort of lemmings level death domino's and now three dudes and somebody's spouse are dead because dude #1 decided not to use X safety equipment and the alarm for thing A was offline, and then dude #2 went in to rescue dude #1 and also died from the unavoidable thing so dude #3- so on and so forth" and "we forgot rust and corrosion is a thing and now someone is dead, even tho Dan warned us 4 months ago something was off"
@@JayPersing - Don't forget about the classic: "Stickers are *so* expensive! We'd go bankrupt if we had to label our barrels and pipes of extremely-reactive chemicals *multiple* times! That's literally redundant!"
@@CheshireCad "this sign isn't for me because I can't read!"
Don't forget "BP being a failure"
To this day, this murderous company has only addressed *HALF* of the recommendations made by CSB.
Thanks for checking up
I wish the CSB had more teeth and send those responsible away for life
Safety is not profitable
@@wolfumz Not in the short term, safety is a long term investment that's hard to quantify.. A fire inspector told that everybody loves a firefighter, nobody like the fire prevention guy.
@@flyingmerkel6 That's a great phrase about the fire prevention guy, I'm going to remember that one, thank you.
Yes, in a sane system, safety is definitely an investment with good returns. These chemical companies, though, like many other companies in American, are only worried about _this_ _quarter's_ profits. An investment that's going to pay off slowly over many years? There's just no financial incentive to make that kind of move. Worse, if you spend a bunch of time/money on safety, and your competitor doesn't, he now has more time/money to out-produce you.
It's the same reason R&D departments totally disappeared in this country. You'll be run out of business overnight if you stick your neck out and think long term.
Love to have the ceiling of my workplace filled with literal tons of almost-thermite.
FYI, iron dust burns a lit better than thermite, provided that you add air. So one lb of airborne iron dust is a lot worse than one lb of thermite.
Big fucking hole coming right up
@@thermophile2106 oh my goodness.
Lol
@@MusicalShenanigans99 lol nailed it buddy
This was so easy to prevent. No excuse! I hope the families got enormous settlements!
that feel when you're binging industrial safety videos and suddenly Tay Zonday appears
THERMITE RAAAAAAAAIIIIN
And suddenly Tay!
None of the families ever sued and the company was only fined $80,000 for the hazardous conditions.
@@edwardsr70 an all to common end to these stories
The narrator near the end stated that this was a tragedy. I disagree. It was a crime.
And the guys responsible get to feel a bit guilty on their next tropical vacation.
It can indeed be both.
hey, cj........like "WORD", y'know?
@@x3wildcard What page should I look at, specifically?
@@Bondubras The page you land on. My take is that Hoeganaes simply refuses to follow any of the advice given
Putting these videos on RUclips is a valuable public service. Thank you CSB!
CBS
The higher ups should be charged with negligent homicide.
tried, and then executed. seems that's the only way people change is when their staring down a gun barrel.
@Samuel SkalaBasically what they've done with health and safety regulations in New Zealand. Management staff are personally responsible for incidents due to their negligence, and can face massive fines and imprisonment.
@Kelly Andrews No, they WOULD know and would ignore them because they are beholden to the stockholders who want as much money as possible. Companies HAVE TO be on a leash so short that the very moment they do something wrong, they'll start chocking. That is the only way that things will be safe for workers.
@Kelly Andrews it is their business to know especially after the first accident. If they try to claim that the company is too big for the senior management to operate the company safely either they should immediately be removed from their positions or the company broken up.
Never happen, it's a British company, B.P. killed 11 men on the deep water horizon, and their two company men responsible were charged and walked away Scot free.
Have dealt with these scumbags in the oil patch for years.
When they say stuff like; “it was thought that during this time the worker closed the valve” you already know the worker either parted or they suffered severe injuries to where they couldn’t talk or were mentally impaired and it’s just heartbreaking.
Parted?
@@chad9166 Left the accident scene in several different directions.
Of all the CSB videos, I think this is the one that makes me the most frustrated based on just how things were allowed to be for so long, and how obvious the danger.
heylookacar I
welcome to having supervisors that KNOW what needs to be done, but want to outproduce the other shifts and housekeeping and dust litigation is "that pussy shit, get back to work". It gets even worse when the dust collector vacuums dont work.
heylookacar Welcome to Robocop: Metalworks edition
Ain’t no iron cause ain’t no dust cause the CSB is a deepstate Soros pawn cause ain’t no collusion
Its the South. The businesses own the republicans that gut regulation and enforcement. The workers vote for them because of social wedge issues. Its a huge clusterfuck.
several accidents, lots of opportunities for the appropriate safety authorities to step in and issue orders, they r also to blame
5:34 Such a seething government-talk burn.
Hey Max Box, never thought I'd see you here
cp_foundry was at the back of my mind during this whole video and then the tf2 guy shows up.
@@gloveboxnapkins7047 Ya it's really too bad seeing he's still around. Was hoping karma caught up with him by now.
@@CIARUNSITE Karma for what?
macks bocks
People who run their business like this need to go to jail, for a long time. They value profit over human life, and the result you get is dead and injured people for a few extra pennies. But instead of real consequences, these companies get a slap on the wrist, and keep operating the same way, because it's cheaper for them to pay small fines when something goes wrong, then it is to provide proper maintenance and safety features.
Having been born in the UK and moved the fuck away from it I guarantee you they don't. The culture there is just a mess of thinking they're better than everyone else. Mention any country to an englishman and he'll start listing reasons why england is better than it.
American companies care more about their employees? Yeah right, all that most companies care about is profit.
Could say the same thing about America. Are you new to youtube? Anybody says anything against America & it's followed by "What shit hole backwards country are you from?" comments.
Problem is? The people who are most likely to be killed or injured as employees are the very people who vote for politicians that limit safety regulations.
Stick it up your slimy limy ass.
FOUR INCHES OF IRON DUST... my GOD! How could you walk into this place as a manager and not feel sick! Absolutely shameless. Thanks to the USCSB, anyone watching should feel good about giving the deuces and walking out of a nightmare like this.
An a HEPA Vaccum could have prevented this
@@the_expidition427
HEPA? Any vacuum would’ve improved the situation
@@neilkurzman4907 Thats the truth
welcome to capitalism, where your safety is irrelevant ib the face if profit
@@Ordoabchao-x9k I’ve heard many people mention capitalism as the root of all problems. What are the alternatives?
In the food and beverage industry, we take lots of precautions to prevent the buildup of dust like this.
You need to install structural members at 45 degrees, with no flat surfaces. You also use special devices called explosion arresters on your powder bins.
Their powder shouldn't be moved by open air conveyors, they should be using pneumatic piping.
This type of system would be sealed, and very little dust would get out.
1:00 that's pretty bad but I'm sure it was a one-off
1:11 ok it can't get any worse now...
1:37 *literally laughing in disbelief*
"2 months later a worker accidentally opened a portal to hell"
"...the flames also ignited the iron dust again and everyone burnt to death"
@@waofy likely there
@@waofy No demons came through the portal however their own safety organization deemed the environment to dangerous for their operations.
@@waofy both of your comments are priceless.
@@waofy oh, and your time stamps are perfect. I pressed each one of them, absolutely perfect. Not even a second off.
8:58 This is why companies can't be trusted to monitor and regulate themselves.
The tragedy is that there's still a ton of people who think standards and regulation are there to cause them grief, instead of curb destructive ignorance.
@NeoRipshaft rules are written in blood
in 2020.... listening to the USA vice-presidental debate. Mike Pence BRAGGING that Trump has repealed a lot of regulations... in the name of business... what a fool.
phxcppdvlazi to be fair he probably was referring to regulations for small businesses
@@phxcppdvlazi The truth is usually somewhere in the middle.
There are definitely regulations that are ridiculous and don't really make sense. Many people will agree about this.
The problem is that even if a regulation is not useful and very cumbersome, it is not easy to remove or modify it.
So hopefully they were focusing on those low impact, highly imcumbering regulations.
That being said, the company in this video should be shut down until it follows the correct regulations. All companies should follow safety regulations. It is up to oversight committees and the government to do their due diligence!
@@phxcppdvlazi Government regulations are horrible things when misused. There are an abundance of unnecessary regulations that overburden small businesses and cause many to fail. Small businesses often need many people hired full-time just to read and comply with all of the extra regulations. Regulations are a often a tool used by the government to control the market. It drives away competition (which is the key to low prices and high quality) and creates artificial entrenchments of massive corporations.
I don't know how this found its way into my recommended but I can't stop watching these videos. They are pretty interesting.
It's amazing people were allowed to work in this environment.
frankmahovolich and that people didn't leave knowing the risks associated with that work environment
It's amazing people assume their company has safety protocols in place, when working at a plant, cover your own ass, and if it looks sketchy, dont do it and find a new job
Been there, done that.
Im still here...
@@seedilicious2936 Really dude? That's something an asshole would say.
@@UltraGamma25 Reality is an asshole.
I like how everytime there's an explosion, the animated workers completely disappear
Lol
Lol
exploded out of existence
Must... resist... reference... to... jojos...
Not... resisting well!!
I don't think they wanted to animate the horrific burns that would be afflicted
Secondary dust explosions are far more hazardous than the primary explosion. It shows to go that house keeping is more than "shine & show", and is integral part of overall risk management.
I hate that they said that "house keeping is ineffective" if you gotta do it 4 times a day, maybe your equipment needs updating. Those employees needs some training too, if you get a gas leak, always assume the worst turn it off god damn it.
Housekeeping seems to be easy pickins for placing blame after industrial incidents/accidents. If you keep the material in the controlled process to start with, then housekeeping won't ever become an issue. That's heirarchy of controls 101.
@@odustbrown1836 Yep, it should be the last line of defense; if dust accumulation even significantly reaches Housekeeping then the plant should be shut down until the stuff's fixed!
It's almost tragic that the factory DIDN'T blow up. Then at least its hazards wouldn't exist anymore.
@@h8GW I'm hoping they changed something in the last ten years. At least bought a cherry picker and a snow shovel or something. "Hey Bert, put this on," "Bob that's a fireman's suit- how did you even-?" " my cousin Vinny is a fireman- anyway put it on" "why?" "Welp, im gonna give you this here snow shovel and then you're gonna go sit in the cherry picker while Mike drives you around, and you're gonna push all the dust off the rafters with the snow shovel so we don't blow up" "this is a terrible idea... change the filters on the HVAC, you owe me a beer" " I'll buy you a shot of vodka after this! Seriously tho put on the fire suit" "what the fuck, Bob"
Similar happened in my shop. An electrical contractor was working on an overhead breaker box. He used an air hose to blow off inches of carbon fiber dust that had accumulated over years of matching composite structures in that area. When he closed the circuit breakers there was a localized flash fire/explosion that blew him off the ladder. He was not seriously burned or injured but it could have been much, much worse. We swept and vacuumed that area until it was spotless.
Wow!! Close call!!
I was working in a drywall factory and 2 maintenance workers opened a dust collector without making sure it was empty first. The entire factory building became engulfed in a dust cloud. The building was evacuated because you couldn't breathe in there. I told the plant safety manager that we should get everyone away from the building because of the risk of combustion (I was also a safety man but for the contractor company that was out there providing millwright services) he dismissed the warning because "FGD isn't flammable". About 2 minutes later there was a sound like the burner on a gas stove igniting and a puff of flame out of the open maintenance bay door. No one was injured, but I can only imagine if someone had been standing near that door.
I worked in the steel industry in the 90’s, we built plants and plant facilities all over North America. There.were piles of steel dust everywhere. Any flat surface in the plants would be coved in a pile of dust. I had no idea of this danger.
To be fair, in most of the steel industry the accumulated dust is mostly oxides which pose no risk of burning. This facility is an exception as they work with powdered metals.
Was gonna say its different because its an alloy. Iron dust itself is combustible but with steel you mix it with Nickel, Chromium and stuff which makes it a lot safer but yea clean up your work area....
Jarthen Greenmeadow steel can still be almost as flammable, but it depends on the alloy. The oxidation will have a bigger effect on safety.
I'm surprised that nobody thought of collecting it -- not even from a safety standpoint, just from an economic one. Is recovering all that metal really not worth the relatively small expense of collecting it?
@@boozydaboozer is aluminum dust flammable?
I just started watching these, I am a student at Oregon state university, a chemical engineering student, I didn't need previous experience for a dust cloud to scare the shit out of me. Seriously, anyone who's seen mythbusters know that any dust is combustible. Not flammable. Combustible.
Canada has the same problem but they did pass laws with more teeth in 2004 because incidents were just seen as a cost of business. Now, if a company, manager or owner knowingly endangers an employee it is a criminal code offense and they can serve jail time and be personally fined. They also gave site inspectors more power. They can completely shut down a site for unsafe practices, revoke permits, and inspectors can show up unannounced. I think the USA needs to look at similar laws.
Canada never banned asbestos though! D:
Corey absolutely. Those laws seem like common sense to me. Also asbestos can be safely used in some situations. Hell, carbon fiber can be worse than asbestos.
Here in Finland it is a workers legal right to refuse dangerous work and or working in dangerous conditions and can't be fired for that.
Opto Phobe the current mood is “the answer is deregulation, what’s the question?”
Hilariously and tragically, many of the regulatory rollbacks don’t even seriously effect production or profits.
They just endanger workers and the environment
@@sampsalol that sounds like s human right that we need
My main question is how was the facility allowed to keep operating after the first flash fire?
money
5:34 - "But the CSB found that housekeeping at Hoeganaes was ineffective." More like, "housekeeping was non-existent." I'm sure most people that worked there considered cleaning up dust to be "menial" work or assumed someone else would do it.
Ever worked retail? Yeah even if you give a damn, you'll be laughed at and disciplined for doing more than the bare minimum amount of work 9 outta 10 of the time. I'm hardly surprised no one who worked there did it.
In a production environment like this, I would imagine that housekeeping was something tacked on to the worker's daily tasks without any room being made in their schedules to accommodate. Basically "Here's the list of work you need to accomplish during the day and it'll take you your entire shift, but try to get in some housekeeping when you can"
I highly doubt they had any dedicated or even semi-dedicated housekeeping staff outside of the offices.
Tennessee, say no more! Foreign companies love the Right To Work southern states and lax regulations and enforcement.
I worked at coal fired power plant 15 year's and this kind of dust build up was not accepted by hourly and management ever!!!
They were asking for it and got it!!! Unfortunately somebody paid will Thier lives, good job SMH
At the factory I worked at we'd shut everything down once a month at least and clean/maintenance machines. In the long run I imagine that saved them a lot of money cause we'd find problems with the machines before they went critical and stopped production unscheduled. Having a clean work environment makes it easier to identify problems and makes the day way more tolerable.
So hire an illegal alien to clean up the dust! Damn there are millions of them needing work. Oh wait. Democrats are paying them to be jobless. My bad.
I really like these videos, its like the history channel but its all the best parts. Really like these videos, went from a random video about delta p, the fact changes in water pressure can suck you into a pool filter/dam/ anything that has to do with cleaning a blockage under water and make you drown/die a horrific death, to these videos describing just how scary it is working in industrial plants. Love your videos, and hope you guys spread the word about how and what not to do.
they are lucky the whole place hasn't gone up in a enormous explosion yet.
5:57 when he said gas line i said oh boy this is gonna be bad
on the bright side, if the place were to get leveled by a big explosion, the corporation can build a new, updated building that's up to standards. apparently they don't mind the smaller bursts, as well as practice little to no maintenance/cleaning.
They probably think that insurance + workers compensation is cheaper than having effective measures in place. Bastards. If my kid would die in a fire in that plant, I would avenge myself on the owners. They just don't give a shit.
The hydrogen explosion would probably have leveled the place, except the iron powder that fell during and after that explosion wasn't confined and also thoroughly mixed with air. Had it been, the whole dust cloud would have burned all at once with an immense blast. The only thing that saved them was that conditions were not quite right. So they only got burning falling clouds of dust. It's hard to believe but that is better than what could have happened.
@@LatitudeSky They were fortunate in that while iron happily oxidizes spontaneously, it's very hard to ignite unless you increase the surface area tremendously (by powdering it). If this had been a sugar plant.. well. the CSB has a report about a sugar plant blowing up to a dust explosion too. It was far worse.
An excellent video on combustible dust. The 2007 OSHA Combustible dust standard was imposed at my facility by management shortly after the rules were written. Many, including myself were skeptical on the hazard. Lesson learned!
One other thing, not only combustibility of steel or iron dust but the ASPIRATION of such by human workers proper!
Fortunately iron can be slowly absorbed by the bodys internal surfaces as a nutrient.
^this Iron is an essential nutrient
Those men are fortified af
@@SuprSi They have skin of steel
@@baloog8 Yes, but I'm sure that the exposure to iron fine particulates illustrated here would cause quite a bit of respiratory system accumulation; that causes serious respiratory issues.
I once got to tour a paper products place and I have doubts that place would ever go up. its dust control was amazing, With filtration units easily the size of a bus.
Those fibers are considered hazardous plus flammable....
The corporatocracy would rather invest in moving production over to a less regulated and litigious country than update their standards and practices.
In China, this video is probably just called Tuesday.
I think you are absolutely correct.
Having been to China, I can confirm. Safety is an afterthought.
b1aflatoxin Thanks to Trump and Republicans we're rolling back safety standards so that Americans can be the victims of industrial accidents. Make America Die Again.
There's a point at which something can no longer be produced profitably. No profit = it won't be produced.
AMEN TO THAT BROTHER!
I work in a uk joinery company and the amount of dust collected by random parts of structure is worrying. Its mdf, chipboard, and wood dust. I make sure to keep the machines clean, and our extractor is also pretty good, but i have asked the managers to have a more stout approach to housekeeping
Heyyyy are you still alive?
@@JayPersing Most definitely still alive mate! Most alive ive ever been 😎 Aced my most recent medical. Housekeeping has been better in recent times :)
@@Daydreaminginmono That's great to hear! Keep pushing for safety!
@@Daydreaminginmono Do you wear a dust mask at work?
One of granddad's was a carpenter and died of lung failure because all all the saw dust he'd breathed in over the years, a bit like coal lung.
@@CynicalOldDwarf Yes mate i do. Im A cnc operator so i get by without most of the time. But if i notice a lot of dust i will mask up. Our extractor is new and very powerful so its not as bad. I did cut one material called “Autex” which is recycled bottle caps, that stuff makes my windpipe itch so mask all the time with that.
I'm glad the general consensus in the comments is that of disgust towards the company. It's a shame the combustible dust legislation was only a guideline at the time of the accidents, but I'm glad it's regulated now.
We should all spare a moment for the families & their frustrations as they would be immense.
Is there a specific OSHA regulation and standard for combustible dust?
I can't find it on their page.
It has always been covered under the general "employer shall provide a safe workplace" provision but as you can see here you can kill 5 people the same way and only get fined $123,000.
That was the proposed fine from the state OSHA. They appealed it so no idea what they actually paid.
Only fine I can find on the fed OSHA for them is in 2017.
A worker suffered an arc flash while repairing a motor on, wait for it, the bag house.
Cost them $7,350.
Even if they had to pay the full $123,000 that would be a bargain compared to what it would cost to clean that place.
Before anyone blames this on Trump that fine was proposed while Obama was pres.
I love binge watching these videos. The narrator is relaxing to listen to. Plus, you learn a lot, too.
This is an excellent video (as area all of CSB's videos). It's sad to see only 65k views on something that should probably be required viewing for all industrial engineers before they graduate! These types of videos should be integrated into manager training programs and facility operator training programs whenever there is such a hazard present.
A lot more eyeballs are rolling through these days. They're getting the attention they deserve
The problem isn't the lack of interest by the engineers. It's that for the company it's more costly to be safe than simply absorb the occasional fines. The death are collateral damage
I think the CSB has pushed huge worldwide progress with the videos on combusible dust (iron/sugar/wood). Workers worldwide know a clean workplace is important, but they don’t know why and can’t argue without arguments. Making the argument available to consumers through RUclips from the CSB, educates general audiences on one of the unexpected yet most widespread hazards.
Why the heck are the photos so grain-HOLY SHIT THAT'S ALL DUST
"The CSB continues to recommend against stick-welding against filled propane tanks inside the oxygen tent". Maybe the CSB needs to start using some stronger language.
That's all they can do. As with the NTSB, they don't have enforcement authority. They can only make recommendations to agencies that do, like OSHA.
@@jdolnick2741 I didn't say the CSB needs to enforce anything, just they need to start calling people dumdum doodoo heads or something.
@@instazx2 I'd PAY to see that in a report.
I work at a plant that bleaches, dyes, prints, and finishes fabric. Lint build-up is a problem, even with our vacuum systems in place. At the end of each week, when operators shut their machines down, they are supposed to blow them down with water and/or air to get any loose lint and either swept up or flushed down the drain.
Occasionally, we end up with operators who fail to clean for several weeks on end, which results in fires that flash up pretty quickly but then burn out just as quick. The usual culprits are younger guys who've barely been there a few months bitching about not being paid enough to clean. Thankfully, all it takes to convince them otherwise is giving them a choice between dealing with dust or dealing with a baby-momma giving them an earful for losing another job. They typically pick the former.
In 2017 I was doing an LED lighting upgrade in Ashville NC, in a complex that used to be a fabric manufacturer for Gildan clothing. There were electrical junction boxes and other conduit parts that were literally so packed with lint we at first thought a mouse must've built a nest somehow. But soon found almost every box we opened up was cram-packed with this lint. The electrician said he never seen anything like that before.
@@at0mix197 I feel your pain. Much love for both Carolinas in which I've lived for many years, but Bubba and LaQueefa are clueless about safety so much so they're difficult to keep on-mission.
The work of the good people at CSB.
Anyone net heeding their recommendations should be held personally accountable, starting from the Congress down to shop mangers.
Sadly, corporations won't spend the money to make the work safer. If pushed, they'll just move to a more accommodating country.
If lives hadn't been lost I'd be saying that the amount of dust build-up shown in those pictures and videos is absolutely hilarious. There is enough dust in that place to set off a nuclear-sized explosion that would've left nothing but a crater where the plant used to be if it had all ignited at the same time. I wonder if that company realizes how unbelievably lucky they were to ONLY lose five workers to fatal dust explosions? I have NEVER seen that much dust piled on absolutely EVERYTHING in a factory before. Frankly I am shocked that the CSB people even had the cojones to take those pics. When I saw 37 inches of dust piled on absolutely everything in sight, I would've been out of that place faster than an Olympic sprinter could've made it to the exit.
Proves the government does a lot of good things, when all it seems we hear is the bad. Great channel, fascinating. Thanks dot gov.
i wouldn't go that far. OSHA is the agency that is actually supposed to enforce these findings and most of the time they don't do shit-all, because they're bought off.
You here the bad because rich scumbags pay for you to hear the bad. Business is the enemy of good government and ONLY good government can protect the public.
Somebody has to
I have, I worked for two companies that lacked job safety,and oaha did nothing but warn when they would be coming out to do inspection's. And at the millwright company(Industrial Maintenance Inc.) they was actually working at Debruce grain elevator south of Wichita,Ks when it blew up. Cause "grain dust accumulation" never found fault of the explosion but the company I worked for (not at the time of the explosion Thank GOD) but my uncle was one of the Foreman's with the outside contractor's and he said dust was piled up four inches and even deeper in some places. Working around grain elevators since I was 16 i have my gueeses what happened but whats important is osha did nothing until it blew up and then they fined all the contractor companies and fined DeBruce. At the other company I worked at we filed a grievance with ohsa over poor air quality and for our trouble they fired us. And worthless osha did their investigation and not once did they interview us. Filed their report and swept it under the rug. And in unemployment court we proved without any shadow of a doubt that the reason our company claimed they fired us was a lie. And because we didn't have money to get a lawyer we was left with only our unemployment wages. You my friend must either work or know someone who works for ohsa,or your just ignorant. This government (which is what ohsa is an agency of) does absolutely nothing for workers safety unless there is an accident then they come out with their greedy little hands out, pretending their doing their jobs. But you go ahead and believe your lying worthless government, I just Pray you or anybody else doesn't have to die to see what Evil lurks in the world. Sorry so long of a comment but it really peeves me off to see posts like this one. And I'm not sure who said good government but there is no such thing. Pathetic, You must be blind
@@LisaBeergutHolst : Thanks. Good link.
any farmer knows about the dangers of grain dust fires and explosions
How to solve this problem:
1. Take photograph of beam with dust on it. The one at 9:30 will do nicely.
2. Get a whisk broom, a dustpan and a plastic bag, and carefully sweep all the dust from that beam into the bag.
3. Weigh the bag on a quality scale and record the weight on a scale ticket.
4. Get a copy of the company's price list. Find whatever that metal is, and highlight the price per pound. Multiply the weight by the price and write that on the scale ticket.
5. Request an audience with the plant manager. Start the meeting with this statement:
"Sir, I know how we can make about a half-million dollars a year in almost pure profit and reduce our insurance premiums, and it will cost us next to nothing."
Show the manager all the evidence you have. Then explain that all that metal dust is just lost profits. Unlike Imperial Sugar. where the wasted sugar has to be thrown away, the metal dust that collects on the plant walls and framing can be thrown back in the process, cleaned and sold.
These guys may not listen to appeals to worker safety or plant integrity, but wave huge amounts of cash in their faces and they will listen.
I work for the company that vacuums up the collected iron powder in that plant. Whatever is vacuumed up goes into a vacuum truck and is ultimately put back through the process, nothing is wasted. When First Response first took over the cleaning operation at that facility, this was after the incident in 2011 and before I started working for First Response, I'd heard they had 20+ vacuum trucks on station, running 24 hours a day. Today, there are just two, one for each building.
That is briliant!
Oh I'm sure they would find a way to sell that sugar to people too.....
I like the way you think.
@@HandleHandle233 I can already see the packaging "added minerals to aid with health"
I've heard of at least one metallurgical powder manufacturer that re-vamped their facilities to include dust-resistant surfaces, and a multi-million dollar dust collection system that not only removes the accumulative airborne particles, but separates the iron components for re-use in the powder manufacturing process...
As the CSB is staffed by profesionals in their fields it should have the power to stop where it finds danger to life and limb and OK work to commence when the situation has been rectified to CSB's satisfaction.
Does a dead worker have less priority than keeping a plant running?
the CSB just investigates. it's up to OSHA to actually do anything, and as other people mentioned, OSHA keeps getting their budget cut and pressured by industry lobbyists.
The fact continued to operate after that many accidents in a span of less then 8 months is crazy
Makes sense that IRON dust is flammible, because when you think of it STEEL WOOL is used as a wick at camp fires.
All dust is highly explosive. From sugar to corn dust.
Almost anything with a high enough surface area to volume ratio is STUPID flammable. Things like ash and sand are obviously exempt from this rule, but metals and plastics and wood are absurdly flammable as dust. I've made a mini flamethrower with an air compressor and flour. It's a little scary
@@LegendLength Think of iron rusting. That's oxidation/combustion, and it actually releases a little bit of heat, but because it's so slow, it's unnoticeable. It's very slow because the surface area to volume ratio of a solid is very small, whereas it's huge in a dust. So the iron dust is just rusting, but very quickly. Old style hand warmers worked the same way I believe, rusting iron filings to make heat
@@altaccount4697 Even a small cabinetmaking in a small farm school near my area has a decent wood dust collecting system for the heavy machinery. Not only because it is flammable, but because of the risk of accidentally ingesting the dust that can ruin our inner bodies after a long while. And of course we pass the broom when the period ends. This company has no excuse.
@@bouteilledeau1463 my school's woodshop spent thousands on a dust collector for exactly those reasons. This was purely human error, not wanting to install proper precautions, and what do you know, saving money on safety never saves you money.
These are absolutely addicting for no reason, incredibly interesting but tragic also, very informative and educational.
Why was this plant not shutdown? When you have so much dust that the fires cause workers to completely disappear into thin air, that's clearly too much dust.
IKR. 4:01!
Why shutdown when can be prevented? I ask why not prevent?
N Kh that’s what I mean... after the first incident, it should have been shutdown for cleaning to at least prevent future accidents
Many years ago, I’d worked in shops with metal dust all over the place. I didn’t know what it was and just thought the shop was dirty. Now I know it wasn’t “dirty”, it was a tinder box.
Laws with teeth need to be passed and people need to go to jail when they grossly violate those laws. I would like to think that these industries would be able to self-govern themselves but it is obvious that they cannot.
+ktrez2000. "laws with teeth" mean nothing if the people tasked with enforcing them are bought and paid for. however there is one thing that is better than money for motivating politicians... the threat of a massive uprising.
They company was fined a measly $49,200 for the first two and $80,000 for the third. What a crock. Should have at least had a 0 added to those.
The fines should be percentages of a company’s profit so that huge companies don’t ignore them because they’re so small and small businesses don’t get demolished.
I am never going to work in a plant with dust
I know right/??!!! DUST IS NOW THE SCARIEST F*CKIN THING EVER! I AM FULLY DE-DUSTING MY HOUSE.
Dude! You could explode at any minute! DUCK!*
*I am not a USCSB representative.
McDastardly And powdered coffee creamer, believe it or not.
Kerbalnaught;
You should really change that to uncontrolled dust. I work for a manufacturer of forged metal products and some of the processes do produce metal dust, but there is an adequate dust recovery program (my employer has no use for metal dust, but scrap metal recyclers will buy the stuff). Along with the dust recovery system, there are fire extinguishers rated against powdered metal fires where such fires might occur.
The amusing irony is that the facility did have a powdered metal fire when sparks from welding were drawn into the dust recovery system. There were no injuries (we got lucky) and the new dust recovery bag house was constructed where another fire of that kind would threaten no nearby work cell.
Of course, I am typing this from Canada. After the Westray mining disaster, when it was found that there were no penalties that were appropriate for the level of safety violations causing multiple deaths, the federal criminal and labour laws were amended to allow employers to be charged with negligent homicide. Now that having workers killed on the job can get the employer, or officers of the employer, a life sentence, workplace safety is a big deal in Canada.
Even FLOUR is highly explosive when in it's dusty form
I must have watched this at least 40 times. Presented this with Hebrew subtitles to a couple of my customers as part of Safety training ( metal fabrication industry ). I get choked up every single time.
Wet dust collectors can help neutralize potentially combustive dusts.
I live near this plant, and I was so sickened and upset when news of this accident happened. I had quit a dangerous job 4 months before in KY and moved to TN to get away from the horrible memories I had of coworkers being killed and injured from a dust explosion at a charcoal plant. My feelings of survivors remorse were brought to an all time high with the news of this tragedy. That company should be destroyed by lawsuits.
Were they shut down? That number of issues that ammount of time, plus the sheer lack of safety precautions I think warrents a shut down.
Not only did they not shut down; but to this very day (8 years later) only 54% of the CSB's recommendations have been addressed by the company. Source: www.csb.gov/hoeganaes-corporation-fatal-flash-fires/
@@x3wildcard That 54% is the number of CSB's recommendations in connection to this case (made to ANY organisation) that have been closed. They only made *4* recommendations *to the Hoeganaes corporation*, and *NONE* of those have been closed. So, you mean "only 0%", not "only 54%".
@@TheHuesSciTech Holy shit.
@@TheHuesSciTech Actually, according to what I read on the site, they made 13 recommendations & Hoeganaes implemented 8 out of those 13.
@@TheCarson116 That's all recommendations made in relation to the case, not the recommendations made *to the Hoeganaes corporation* . Click "View All" under "Recommendations" on the site, and you'll see 0/4 for the corporation.
I can’t believe this was 11 years ago and I’m watching it like it was yesterday.
Wonderfully done, thank you for your hard work and dedication and time for educational experience. Thank you.
Something to think about: thermite is a mixture of iron oxide and metallic aluminum. when ignited, the oxygen atom is pulled from the iron and bonded to the aluminum, becoming hot enough to melt the entire mixture. this is how rail tracks are typically welded. While it's the aluminum that is burning in this case, it's not hard to imagine that similar amount of energy being produced in an aerosol.
also, a flint and steel works by using flint to shave off bits of iron. these freshly made shavings have clean, oxidized surfaces, and so rapidly combust. tiny as they are, that small amount of oxidation is enough to turn the sparks yellow hot. Imagine that, but as a dense cloud all around you.
TL;DR metal is hard to burn, but when it does, they put off a crazy amount of heat.
No need to stress about the TL:DR bit, that was an interesting read
I worked in a manufacturing plant next to a feed mill. Some of our dry ingredients came from that feed mill and as a supervisor I had to go in the feed mill occasionally. The amount of dust and aerosolized dust terrified me.
It doesn't take a genius to know that fine dust ignites.
I learned about that during the first year of college in the work safety class a decade ago.
I agree. The problem is that most tradesman and general workers haven't received that training. If the company doesn't provide the training, and you get hired to work there, how would you know? I worked for a company that used silica fire brick for building furnaces. The silica dust accumulated everywhere, not unlike this video. The people there said 'oh it's just like the stuff on a beach.' Then I found out a number of people were no longer there, because they had gotten cancer and died, including the guy I replaced. I got sick with silicosis. I was out of work for 4 weeks and still have scarred lungs from an incident there. I looked into it and found out that coal mines are shut down when they drill into a vein of sand. Plasterers come in and seal off the vein with cement, to prevent worker exposure. In a coal mine!
I quit shortly after. That company is still in business, however.
Fun fact: They had to pay the amazing fine of $80,000 for one of the explosions that killed three people. How they can keep the lights on after that kind of punishment is amazing.
Bribes, thats what they did.
Metal powders are often used in fireworks. The burn temperatures of AL,
Magalum, iron, titanium, and magnesium
give different colors and radiances.
i sanded a small mountain bike spring for an hour in my garage with the door open and there was metal dust in my nose for 24 hours after, i can’t imagine how much dust is in these workers bodies
Executives and owners would have gone to prison in many countries. Usually not in USA, though.
No here they are padded on the backs, handed money bags, and take their positions in the government
It’s not always the executives fault. Even though much of the time it is. It’s best to identify the person who is actually responsible and prosecute them. Especially owners. If you owned stock in this company then technically you were an owner, but how can you be responsible?
Go AstroTurf somewhere else.
Someone’s a conspiracy theorist
I was a truck driver for a while and visited many a production and warehouse facility and more often than not was appalled by the condition of many facilities I visited
And this is why I love the CSB: laying down the shade against other organizations for doing a terrible job
In my experience, dust collection and ventilation are among the first things to be tampered with or shut off by maintenance.
“Why is there powder?”
“It’s a chronic buildup, of, my favorite iron dust”
"Pretty sure that's an OSHA violation."
@@FASTERLANEDisBACK This is my house dude
Dont jostle the heating vents
Ok, I had to listen to that like 8 times, and then I checked 3 description-3 SEPARATE EXPLOSIONS? *AT THE SAME PLACE*?!?......
A lot of plant owners are as tightfisted as Mr. Spacely!
California and much of Europe have pretty strict safety regulations and they still seem to be able to compete pretty well in the world's markets. These simple safety measures (e.g. plain old housekeeping) aren't nearly as expensive as they've tricked you into believing.
This is a constant problem in a number of industries including coal mining, textiles, sand, and wood. Dust is both a health hazard and fire hazard. Also these constant threats of if you don't like it go work elsewhere or we can always move somewhere the workers won't be as picky about safety and health.
Most of these accidents are preventable however companies will have to accept lower profits. When they claim they can't compete that means that they could be making higher profits not that their is any real price difference in the market between a product produced in China or the US.
The irony is that the dust is not an unintended consequence of a manufacturing process, it is the product!
All of that dust in that facility was unpackaged product. Proper dust control measures would have paid for themselves in improved plant efficiencies.
One of the root causes of all of the described accidents is management not understanding the opportunity cost of not shipping all of the product uselessly piled up in their plant.
That may or may not be true in this business and others. Nevertheless dust is always a problem in industries where dust is created. It can be a slip and fall hazard or an explosive hazard. Management doesn't like to halt production when dust collection equipment needs repair.
In my country, flammable odorless gass has odor added to it to so it can be identified if there is a leak. Is this seriously not a thing abroad?
This company is horrible. That many incidents and not fixing the issues? Wtf?
After the first investigation revealing 4 inches of dust caked everywhere, how in the hell was this place not closed down and completely cleaned.
Dirty filthy place, a daily hazard to workers' lungs even without the explosion risk.
If they are never going to give a ratsass for worker safety over production and profit then they need to realize the money lost with tons of wasted product floating around their facilities which could be reclaimed and put back in the production line.
Ive been obsessed watching these channels where it recreates work place accidents.. I found a couple that are excellant. I think this is important to use as a point of reference and a way humans can learn to not repeat the same mistakes. However its tragic people have to lose there lives for improper maintenance etc.
Dust control???? What to you mean, dust control? Don't you realize that would cost money???
When someone tries to claim that safety reglations are an unnecessary burden on industry, send them links to a few CSB videos. Keep up the good work CSB!
4:41 imagine the inspector accidentally starting yet another fire holy shit lmao
The shyt that happens down south in the factories. I work up north but we frequently go down to repair. It's worse than you could possibly imagine
One issue with the NFPA codes is that they do not require existing facilities to retrofit to the new codes every time they change them, only for new facilities to be built within the specs of the new codes. Ideally OSHA should have shut the facility down after the first incident occurred, allowing them only to reopen after passing a good housekeeping inspection with a random follow-up. This could have prevented the rest of the following incidents.
Long before these accidents a friend of mine worked for a major supplier for machinery at this plant. Some of the bad things he told me about that place made me not want to be close to it.
OK, So I live in Europe. I don't know about all the in and outs of US workplace safety regulations, but am I right in saying that CSB only make recommendations and are not able to carry out enforcement? I've watched a fair few of these videos in the last week and I'm shocked. You guys in the US do, to be fair, have a hell of a lot of heavy industry, but the accident rate seems to be huge compared with in the EU. In the UK the last industrial explosion with major loss of life was about 5 years ago if memory serves (a wood dust explosion). Prior to that it was probably the buncefield refinery fire ten years before, which killed nobody. The Gallatin scenario would just never happen here. If the plant wasn't up to standards it would never be cleared to operate. If maintainence was not carried out to standards it would be picked up in inspection and shut down. After the first accident the Health and Safety Executive would have inspected and shut the plant down until remedial work could be carried out. Prosecutions would have ensued. We had a lot of major disasters in the 80's, until we got a grip. Before the Grenfell Tower fire the last ones almost faded into memory. It is amazing to me that this sort of thing keeps happening. Write your Congressman!
To be fair, the U.S. is a bigger place, meaning that there are more industrial buildings and facilities out there, meaning that there's a higher chance that at least one of them in a given time will have an accident, for one reason or another. Though that doesn't mean that our regulations are good. The CSB mainly investigates and makes recommendations, OSHA is the ones who are supposed to be enforcing and creating regulations, but do a crap job of actually enforcing, and both OSHA and the CSB are facing potential budget cuts (from what I heard) because of lobbying companies wanting less regulations on how to run shit safely, and because of other politics, which I think one of the things that's fueling the want for deregulation of the industry is because the industries in the U.S. has to compete with the industries in China, which have next to no regulations, and thus can make stuff cheaper than places here in the U.S.
Writing to Congress doesn't do anything unless you attach about $10k to that letter. We still have an entire city here with poisoned water. On top of a lot of states being right to hire, if you get sick or injured off the clock you can be fired and replaced like a cog.
Did you miss that this plant is owned by a European company?
I rather much suspect all their plants are ran like this.
Actually, no. I didn't miss that. This happened under the regulatory system in the US though. Foreign owned companies operating in the US operate under the same rules as US owned companies. To do otherwise would leave them at a competitive disadvantage, so market forces force a rush to the minimum allowable standards. In the EU there are laws that apply across EU member territories for this reason - no European nation can gain a competitive advantage by undercutting the safety standards of their neighbors. I would hope that moral businesses would operate to the highest standards whatever the legislative space they operate in, however this is obviously going to place them at a disadvantage when operating in a regulatory environment that holds life in such poor regard.
In Europe these sort of accidents are very rare these days. In the US they are not. If you really want to look at accidents caused by foreign companies operating outside their home territories have a look at Bhopal and Piper Alpha.
Our congressmen are bought and paid for by the ultra wealthy who own these plants. The plant owners don't want safety enforcement because it interferes with production (profits) and their risk/reward calculations say it is more profitable to have an unsafe plant that causes damage, loss of life, legal settlements, fines and penalties, etc. etc. than it is to make the plants actually safe. This is so because there is no incentive (criminal liability/accountability, brought on by laws and their respective law enforcement agencies) for these owners to do it. If it becomes cheaper to actually make a plant safe, they will. But rest assured, it'll never happen, not while human greed is running rampant and unchecked by deregulation and an inability for agencies to enforce the rules they set forth.
Grain dust is highly explosive. I did a temp job for a week or two at a granary, and they made me watch training videos showing big concrete grain silos with massive holes blown out of them.
My job was to go around the plant sweeping up the grain dust. After my temp position ended, they didn't take me back.
Temp means temporary. Unlike most of the rest of the world it also means no insurance and no retirement.
Besides the chance of dust combusting, imagine breathing that dust for 40 plus hours a week. Can’t say for sure but I bet the life expectancy after retirement won’t be very long.
Its something people dont think about. I currently work as a safety professional in the oil and gas industry, but i have worked safety and industrial rescue in many different industries. Combustible dust is a huge issue, especially metal. Think about the melting point of a metal. Well that same metal will burn even hotter than its melting point. Certain metals can even become Pyrophoric if the "dust" is made of small enough particals, for example aluminum, it is extremely energetic, and burns at over 3000°F (1700°C). Being engulfed in a flash fire that hot would instantly cause fatal burns. Iron powered burns even hotter than that. The flame front also moves through the dust cloud at such a high speed that it propagates into a blast wave (explosion) like a fuel air explosive (thermobaric bomb). In other words it can make for a really, really bad day.
This is also a MAJOR failure of regulators. The moment the flammable dust buildup was documented after the first incident the whole plant should have been shut down.
Here in Califonria my uncle used to work in fire safety and inspection. The marshal could close a business so fast your head would spin for a serious violation.
The CSB is an investigative organization, and they are not allowed to shut down plants. They may, though, bring this to the attention of people who do have that power and that is what they do through these videos.
Thank you for allowing comments! Your work saves lives.
I’m trying to take this seriously but the animations are wild lmao.
The animations are extremely useful. I have no idea what you find funny about them.
How many accidents Did that company have to have in order for somebody to step in and close them down For safety updates in right now it sounds like multiple government agencies failed
"why is there powder"
"it's a chronic build up of my favourite iron dust"
"I'm pretty suRe thats an OSHA ViOlaTion"
sitting here amazed at the sheer amount of negligence involved.
You can feel a lot more frustration and anger in this video than their usual ones. This one must have hit them hard.
You know it’s gonna be a brutal video when a csb video starts off with sad music
These videos are very informative. The loss of life and injury is awful. For those interested, search for Paul O’Neill Alcoa. This man changed the culture at Alcoa and made safety the #1 priority at that company.
Yup. And unfortunately it went south after he left
How was this plant allowed to continue operating after the first 2 events???
I never knew iron dust was flammable like that...