CENtral Science

Friday chemical safety round-up

Photo by Jorge Intriago of Columbia, S.C., submitted to OSHA's "Picture It!: Safe Workplaces for Everyone" contest

Chemical health and safety news from the past two weeks (hope no one’s Thanksgiving turkeys caught fire!):

• Derek Lowe is looking for “Things I Won’t Work With” suggestions to include in an e-book
• On the uncertainties of scale up, with a quote from R.B. Woodward: “Ten grams! Harry! Even I don’t know all the things that could go wrong in that kind of reaction.”
• Commentary on the CSB/TTU report: A blueprint for safety action now
• OSHA announced the winners of its “Picture It! Safe Workplaces for Everyone” photo contest, and what looks like a chemistry-related photo from the South Carolina National Guard earned an honorable mention. Check out more of the photos at the Department of Labor’s Flickr stream.
• OSHA also issued a new “National Emphasis Program (NEP) for chemical facilities to protect workers from catastrophic releases of highly hazardous chemicals”
• Companies are failing to provide the safety data required by Europe’s sweeping chemicals law REACH (registration, evaluation, authorization and restriction of chemicals)
• DuPont agreed to pay $500,000 to settle state and federal accusations the company polluted the Delaware River with toxic industrial chemicals “numerous” times in the past six years; meanwhile, “CEO Ellen Kullman has met with President Obama, urging less cumbersome regulations and lower taxes to make it more attractive for her company to site more factories and jobs in the U.S.”

Fires and explosions:

• An explosion at a melamine production facility in eastern China killed 14 workers
• A fire at Imperial Auto Industries in India started when “factory workers were heating some chemicals on stove when it backfired. The fire then spread to the nearby drums that were containing thinner”; two people died and about twenty more were burned
• Liquid oxygen exploded at All Molded Plastics in Connecticut; one worker was injured by shrapnel
• An acetylene cylinder exploded at Irish Oxygen, in Ireland; two workers were injured
• A fire at Technical University, in Austria, started with metallic lithium
• A fire in a University of Kansas medicinal chemistry laboratory started when a refrigerator overheated
• Four Minnesota ninth graders were burned after their science teacher allegedly dropped a match in a jug of methanol

Leaks, spills, and other exposures:

• A worker fell and immersed his leg in a vat of nitric acid and sodium dichromate at Technical Finishes & Coatings Plating in Wisconsin
• Some sort of mixture of tolune, screen coating paint, and a thermoplastic acrylic resin spilled at Vivid Image in Wisconsin; one worker died and another was hospitalized; “All chemicals believed to be used in the projection screen manufacturing process / 5 gallon containers of each substance were found tipped over and empty.”
• Chlorine mixed with fluorine at a water plant in Florida; ten people were taken to the hospital
• Chlorosilane was released from Hemlock Semiconductor in Michigan; “roads were blocked around the factory and nearby residents were told to stay indoors”
• Ammonium nitrate spilled at Dublin Port, in Ireland
• “Corrosive elements” spilled at specialty chemical company ICL Industrial Products in New York
• Mercury spilled from a broken blood pressure machine at a doctor’s office in Texas and a thermometer at ECPI University in Virginia

Not covered: meth labs; ammonia leaks; incidents involving floor sealants, cleaning solutions, or pool chemicals; and fires from oil, natural gas, or other fuels