United Kingdom
Two
students injured in explosion in University of Liverpool=92s chemistry
department
Dec 10 2009
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TWO
students were treated for injuries after a laboratory explosion at the
University of Liverpool.
Three people were conducting an experiment in the
chemistry department, on Crown Street, Liverpool city centre, at around
midday yesterday when the explosion occurred.
A man and
a woman, both aged around 25, suffered lacerations to their faces and
upper bodies caused by flying shards of glass and flash burns. A third
student who was standing nearby was unharmed.
The group
were carrying out a distillation experiment in a fume cabinet in a
corner of the laboratory.
It is believed three chemicals reacted together in a
ceramic oil burner. tolypridine n-oxide, a form of sulphate and
perchloric - using a ceramic oil burner. It caused a large blast which
sent the two students reeling and caused three windows in the first
floor laboratory to be blown out.
The victims=92 burns were
described as "fairly extensive" and the students were taken by ambulance
to the Royal Liverpool hospital.
A supervising professor is
understood to have been in the laboratory or near the room. Early
indications suggest it was not an underhand or "rogue" experiment, as
the steps appeared to have been logged in a book.
The
quantity of chemicals used is understood to be small, although the major
component was ethanol.
The Health Protection Agency was informed and
confirmed there was no wider risk from the blast.
Professor
Andrew Hodgson, of the chemistry department, said: "Two students were
hurt and taken to hospital, but they=92re going to be all
right."
===
Topeka, Kansas
Last Update: 12/09 10:44
pm
Hazmat Called for Chemical Concern
A mix-up
in chemicals forced the evacuation of a Topeka business Wednesday
afternoon.
The fire department was called out to Ameripride just
after 1 about a possible chemical spill.
Crews
arrived and found no spill, rather, two different chemicals that
shouldn't have been mixed together had been and that caused a chemical
reaction.
3 or 4 people were taken to the hospital with
respitory problems but have since been treated and
released.
The building was evacuated, so crews could get the
problem taken care of.
===
West
Virginia
Chlorine
vapors sicken nine people, including children at Ohio County
hotel
Emergency crews were called to a hotel under
renovation for the second time within the past few
days.
By Keri
Brown
December 11, 2009 =B7 A family and their children were
rushed to local hospitals Wednesday night after being exposed to strong
chlorine vapors from the pool and hot tub area at the Comfort Inn hotel
near Wheeling.
This is the second time
within a few days that emergency crews have responded to calls for
chemical leaks at the Comfort Inn off of Dallas Pike near
Wheeling.
On
Sunday, three people were treated at area hospitals for carbon monoxide
poisoning after a construction worker allegedly left a torpedo heater
running. The hotel currently is undergoing renovations.
Then
around 9:00 p.m. Wednesday night, firefighters responded to a call for a
chlorine leak. According to EMS Director for the Valley Grove Volunteer
Fire Department, Fred Misenhelder, the incident occurred when a family
from Cleveland, staying at the hotel, tried to use the hot
tub.
=93Both
the pool and the hot tub had been treated or chlorinated lets say
earlier in the day. This was the information we got from hotel
management but nobody had used the area and I guess when the family came
in that was involved in the incident, when they raised the cover off of
the hot tub, all the vapors that were being held in by the cover of
course escaped and they were right there,=94 said
Misenhelder.
Misenhelder said shortly after, one of the children began
vomiting. Other family members experienced shortness of breath and
burning of the eyes and nose.
According
to Misenhelder, nine people, including a 3-year-old and 5-year-old were
treated at local hospitals and are expected to be OK.
Emergency
crews were able to contain the chlorine vapors by closing off the pool
area. No one staying at the hotel was evacuated.
A hazmat
team was also called to the scene.
===
Kansas City
Fire department first responders to acid spill
News - North
Kansas City
WRITTEN BY MEAGAN
O'DONNELL
THURSDAY, 10 DECEMBER 2009
00:01
Accidental spill on Paseo
Bridge tests fire and police readiness, training
A tanker
truck accident that spilled hundreds of gallons of hydrochloric acid in
Kansas City last week tested the response ability of the North Kansas
City fire and police departments.
Fire Chief Dave Williams
said North Kansas City firefighters were first on the scene of the
accident that involved only the truck hauling the acid.
The
accident happened at approximately 7:15 a.m. on Nov. 30 in the
northbound ramp of the Paseo Bridge near Interstate 35 and Front Street
in Kansas City. The leak began soon after but had slowed by
approximately 9:30 a.m. Lanes of the interstate remained closed for most
of the day.
Williams said because of early morning traffic and
blocked southbound lanes Kansas City response services could not reach
the accident quickly so North Kansas City was called to respond. North
Kansas City firefighters pulled the driver from the truck and the
department=92s ambulance transported him to the
hospital.
According to a press release from the Missouri
Department of Natural Resources, who also responded to the accident, the
tanker was carrying an estimated 45,000 pounds of hydrochloric acid and
the wreck caused a loss of approximately 500 gallons of the hazardous
chemical onto the roadway.
Kansas City=92s Isle of Capri Casino, 1800 E. Front
St., was locked down during the incident because of its close proximity
to the spill and the hazardous cloud of chemicals it released into the
air. Williams said North Kansas City personnel went to the casino to
keep people inside and the area secure. They also had personnel
monitoring North Kansas City=92s air quality, especially in the nearby
Paseo Industrial District.
North Kansas City Police Chief Glenn Ladd said 11
people from the scene were transported to the hospital for treatment of
fume inhalation. Six were police officers, one being a North Kansas City
officer.
The day after the accident, Ladd said the officer had
been released and was back on the job.
Mayor
Bill Biggerstaff commended the fire and police departments for their
professionalism and training utilized to respond to the
accident.
"I am very proud of these two departments,"
Biggerstaff said.
The trucking company, Occidental Chemical Corp. of
Wichita, Kan., hired an environmental contractor to conduct the cleanup
and none of the acid was reported to have reached the nearby Missouri
River, according to the press release.
===
Houston
For one
agency, bang wasn't big enough
Shortages of staff and money
keep a federal group from investigating blasts like the one that shook
the Seabrook area
By
STEWART M. POWELL
WASHINGTON BUREAU
Dec. 10,
2009, 9:58AM
Wednesday's blast at the American Acryl plant in
Seabrook sent a plume of smoke across the area.
WASHINGTON =97 Explosions at two Houston-area industrial
plants in the last week, including Wednesday's chemical plant blast in
Seabrook, killed one person and injured four others, but the federal
agency charged with investigating such incidents won't probe either one,
federal officials confirmed Wednesday.
The
reason: chronic shortages of staff and money, said John Bresland,
chairman of the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board. The
board will investigate a manufacturing plant accident in Illinois that
killed a truck driver.
Bresland said his 40-person, $10.6 million-a-year
investigative agency does not have enough people to handle more than the
16 investigations that are already under way =97 a fraction of the
dozens of accidents at refineries and chemical plants each
year.
=93We would like to investigate more accidents but
that would require additional resources from Congress,=94 Bres land said
in a telephone interview.
But the board's practice of picking and choosing the
accidents it investigates remains a point of contention for Congress'
watchdog Government Accountability Office.
Bresland's agency =93continues to fall short of its statutory
mandate=94 by failing to investigate =93all accidental releases that
have a fatality, a serious injury, substantial property damage or the
potential for a fatality, serious injury or substantial property
damage,=94 the GAO said last August.
===
Texas
Sonora
explosion injures worker
Chemicals
are not toxic, company says
By Justin Zamudio
Posted
December 10, 2009 at 12:16 p.m. , updated December 10, 2009 at 8:46
p.m.
SAN ANGELO, Texas =97 A chemical explosion at a
Multi-Chem plant in Sonora sent one man to the hospital with internal
bruising.
The explosion happened Wednesday afternoon as a plant
operator was filling a chemical tote, said Marcus Lopez, attorney for
Multi-Chem. The man was airlifted to Brooke Army Medical Center in San
Antonio, Lopez said.
The worker=92s identity was not disclosed by
Multi-Chem or the Sutton County Sheriff=92s Office. The man resides in
the Sonora area, Lopez said.
Cade Bourque, environmental health and safety director
for Multi-Chem, said the injuries were sustained from the rupturing of
the chemical tote. He said the container ruptured because of a chemical
reaction.
=93The explosion was small and contained to the area
of the worker,=94 Lopez said. =93These aren=92t toxic chemicals of any
kind =97 it wasn=92t a flammable explosion. ... Nobody else was hurt
from it.=94
The chemicals that caused the container to rupture are
unknown, Bourque said. He said Multi-Chem is conducting an
investigation.
Sutton County Sheriff Joe Fincher said that the call
came in just before 3 p.m. Wednesday and that his department, the Sonora
Police Department and the Sonora Fire Department
responded.
The ambulance transported the victim to the Lillian M.
Hudspeth Memorial Hospital in Sonora.
Because
the injuries were thought to be more severe at the time, he was
airlifted to San Antonio, Bourque said.
=93The
injuries to the employee aren=92t as bad as thought,=94 Bourque said.
=93The latest we=92ve heard is he has some internal bruising, no broken
bones, no chemical burning.=94
The man=92s family is with
him, Lopez said.
The Sutton County plant is a chemical storage,
distribution and blending facility, Bourque said.
