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Chemical Safety Headlines From Google
Friday, October 17, 2014 at 7:51:56 AM
A service of the ACS Division of Chemical Health and Safety
All article summaries and tags are archived at http://pinboard.in/u:dchas
Table of Contents (17 articles)
HAZMAT TRUCK LEAK CLOSES PART OF WALDEN AVENUE IN ALDEN
Tags: us_NY, transportation, release, response, other_chemical
HAZMAT CREW RESPONDS TO UPPER EAST SIDE CONDO AFTER POSSIBLE EBOLA CASE REPORTED
Tags: us_NY, public, discovery, response
'CLIPBOARD MAN' WITHOUT A HAZMAT SUIT AT EBOLA FLIGHT EXPLAINED
Tags: us_TX, public, discovery, environmental
FIRE ENGULFS FACTORIES IN REVESBY
Tags: Australia, industrial, explosion, response, flammables
INCIDENT AT YEAGER AIRPORT RESULT OF PERSONAL HYGIENE PRODUCTS
Tags: us_WV, public, release, injury, unknown_chemical
PENN STATE STUDENT HURT IN LABORATORY EXPLOSION
Tags: us_PA, laboratory, explosion, injury, unknown_chemical
TRAFFIC RESTRICTED AFTER HAZMAT TEAM CALLED TO RUH
Tags: Canada, laboratory, release, response, unknown_chemical
ITALY FIRE OPENS SEEDY SIDE OF CHINESE MIGRANT LABOUR
Tags: Italy, industrial, follow-up, death, illegal
UCLA'S LEGAL FEES IN FATAL LAB FIRE CASE NEARED $4.5 MILLION
Tags: us_CA, laboratory, follow-up, death
REMOVING GLOVES AND OTHER PROTECTIVE EQUIPMENT
Tags: us_IA, laboratory, discovery, response
METH MAKING BLAMED FOR MUNCIE MOTEL FIRE
Tags: us_IN, public, fire, response, meth_lab
METH CITY: NEIGBOURS TELL OF DEVASTATION OF BACKYARD DRUG COOKS
Tags: Australia, public, follow-up, environmental, meth_lab
HAZMAT UNITS RESPOND TO INDUSTRIAL ACCIDENT AT MIDLAND BUSINESS
Tags: us_TX, industrial, release, injury, unknown_chemical
EMPLOYEES AT YEAGER AIRPORT "DECONTAMINATED" AFTER EXPOSURE TO U
Tags: us_WV, transportation, release, response, unknown_chemical
5 EXPOSED TO AMMONIA LEAK AT FROZEN-FOOD WAREHOUSE
Tags: us_FL, industrial, release, injury, ammonia
TEXAS A&M STUDENT IN CRITICAL CONDITION AFTER INGESTING SODIUM CYANIDE
Tags: us_TX, education, release, death, cyanide
SECOND TEXAS WORKER WITH EBOLA TOOK FLIGHT BEFORE FALLING ILL
Tags: us_MA, public, discovery, response
---------------------------------------------
HAZMAT TRUCK LEAK CLOSES PART OF WALDEN AVENUE IN ALDEN
Tags: us_NY, transportation, release, response, other_chemical
A section of Walden Avenue in the Town of Alden is closed because of material leaking from a tanker truck that has split, emergency crews are reporting from the scene.
The closure is between Town Line and Wende roads. Hazardous materials teams from numerous fire companies are responding to the scene.
The material has been described as ?pitch,? which is a hot substance used in roofing projects.
---------------------------------------------
HAZMAT CREW RESPONDS TO UPPER EAST SIDE CONDO AFTER POSSIBLE EBOLA CASE REPORTED
Tags: us_NY, public, discovery, response
First responders in full hazmat gear showed up at a ritzy Upper East Side condo Thursday on a report of a possible Ebola case, law enforcement said.
Paramedics, dressed head to toe in protective attire, were seen taking a woman from a pricey Park Ave. condo near E. 61st St. where living spaces sell for up to $5 million dollars, at about 2:30 p.m.
An FDNY spokesman said two people were transported from the address suffering from respiratory and cardiac distress.
Neither was listed as fever/travel patients, the FDNY's code for people suffering from Ebola-like symptoms.
One of the patients was taken to New York Hospital, the spokesman said. The second was taken to Bellevue Hospital, which has a special quarantine room in its emergency room along with an isolation chamber that can hold up to four patients, he said.
---------------------------------------------
'CLIPBOARD MAN' WITHOUT A HAZMAT SUIT AT EBOLA FLIGHT EXPLAINED
Tags: us_TX, public, discovery, environmental
The man seen not wearing a hazmat suit while standing just feet away from the second nurse with Ebola as she was transported to Emory University hospital did not need to wear the protective gear, the medical airline said.
The nurse, identified Wednesday as Amber Vinson, was flown from Dallas to Atlanta on medical airline Phoenix Air.
She was seen being transported to and from the ambulance by three people in full-body hazmat suits, but the fourth person by her stretcher was wearing plainclothes and holding a clipboard.
The airline confirmed to ABC News that the man was their medical protocol supervisor who was purposefully not wearing protective gear.
"Our medical professionals in the biohazard suits have limited vision and mobility and it is the protocol supervisor?s job to watch each person carefully and give them verbal directions to ensure no close contact protocols are violated," a spokesperson from Phoenix Air told ABC News.
"There is absolutely no problem with this and in fact ensures an even higher level of safety for all involved," the spokesperson said.
---------------------------------------------
FIRE ENGULFS FACTORIES IN REVESBY
Tags: Australia, industrial, explosion, response, flammables
A massive fire that engulfed a factory containing thousands of litres of flammable liquid could burn for days in Sydney's south-west.
NSW Fire & Rescue Superintendent Ian Krimmer said the fire in an industrial zone in Revesby was now under control but not yet extinguished.
"The factory is all collapsing onto itself so it could burn for a couple of days," Superintendent Krimmer said.
Thick black smoke fills the sky as a blaze burns in south-west Sydney. Photo: Nick Moir
One hundred firefighters worked to contain the blaze, which started in an a car parts factory on Marigold Street about 11am.
When firefighters arrived at the scene they were faced with huge columns of black smoke, explosions and a fast-moving fire.
NSW Fire & Rescue Commissioner Greg Mullins said chemical solvents in the car manufacturing plant had caused explosions that sent huge balls of fire shooting into the sky.
---------------------------------------------
INCIDENT AT YEAGER AIRPORT RESULT OF PERSONAL HYGIENE PRODUCTS
Tags: us_WV, public, release, injury, unknown_chemical
A chemical leak at Yeager Airport late Wednesday that sent two airport workers to the hospital and closed the airport for about three hours was an accident, airport officials believe.
Yeager Airport Director Rick Atkinson said the substance released when a Delta Air Lines staff member opened a piece of luggage was the result of two personal hygiene products mixing together.
?Somehow the stuff just got tossed around and maybe broke or something,? he said. ?A little bit of it is fine. A lot of it in a concentrated space is going to irritate your nose and eyes.?
Terry Sayre, the airport?s assistant director, said the bag had been reported missing from a flight the day before and had arrived at the airport as a lost bag.
Sayre said the bag had been sitting at Delta for about 12 hours when a staffer decided to open it to confirm the owner. When the bag was opened, the substance was released, he said.
About 45 minutes later, two Delta employees started having breathing problems. Two airport staffers were decontaminated at the airport and two were sent to CAMC General Hospital for decontamination ?out of an abundance of caution,? airport spokesman Mike Plante said Wednesday.
---------------------------------------------
PENN STATE STUDENT HURT IN LABORATORY EXPLOSION
Tags: us_PA, laboratory, explosion, injury, unknown_chemical
STATE COLLEGE, Pa. (AP) - Penn State's department of environmental health and safety has been investigating a small explosion at a campus laboratory that burned a student.
School officials aren't identifying the student who was doing a tissue culture in the Agricultural and Biological Engineering Building when the explosion occurred in an exhaust hood about 5:30 p.m. Wednesday.
Svend Peterson, the assistant safety officer of the Alpha Fire Company in State College, says investigators are trying to determine if alcohol being used for sterilization could have caused the blast.
University officials say there didn't appear to be damage to the building, though they were still attempting to determine whether any lab equipment was damaged.
The student was taken to Mount Nittany Medical Center, where information about the student's condition was not immediately available Thursday.
---------------------------------------------
TRAFFIC RESTRICTED AFTER HAZMAT TEAM CALLED TO RUH
Tags: Canada, laboratory, release, response, unknown_chemical
Traffic to Royal University Hospital was restricted Thursday after a Hazmat team was called to a reported chemical spill.
Saskatoon fire crews, including a hazardous materials team, were called to a laboratory on the third floor of the hospital at 2:45 p.m.
?We got the call of an odd smell on the third floor of RUH in the lab. We sent out a Hazmat team to investigate. We did testing for numerous chemicals and have found nothing at this time,? said assistant fire chief Morgan Hackl.
Only the lab was evacuated, according to Hackl.
Saskatoon police controlled traffic to RUH for about an hour. The restriction led to some congestion on College Drive, Hackl said.
---------------------------------------------
ITALY FIRE OPENS SEEDY SIDE OF CHINESE MIGRANT LABOUR
Tags: Italy, industrial, follow-up, death, illegal
There was no fire alarm fitted at the garment factory outside Florence where Chen Changzhong worked and lived.
Heat finally startled him awake on the morning of December 1 last year. Before him was a wall of burning fabric. He raced through the building and became the only worker to survive.
Seven people died at the Teresa Moda factory in Prato, a largely Chinese manufacturing district in Tuscany.
It was the deadliest in memory, exposing the true costs of cheap clothes and the pursuit of profit over safety in the thriving, illicit economy that has grown out of Chinese immigration to Italy.
---------------------------------------------
UCLA'S LEGAL FEES IN FATAL LAB FIRE CASE NEARED $4.5 MILLION
Tags: us_CA, laboratory, follow-up, death
After UCLA chemistry professor Patrick Harran walked out of court in June, his lawyers issued a news release hailing the "first-of-its-kind" deal that all but freed him from criminal liability in a 2008 lab fire that killed a staff researcher.
The "deferred prosecution agreement" that allowed Harran to avoid pleading guilty or no-contest to any charge might have been a novel resolution, as his attorneys said.
But it certainly didn't come cheap.
Top-tier law firms hired to defend him and the University of California against felony charges in the death of Sheharbano "Sheri" Sangji charged more than 7,700 billable hours and nearly $4.5 million in fees, according to documents obtained by The Times through a California Public Records Act request.
We defended ourselves and our faculty member as was our right and obligation, using funds in a systemwide self-insurance program.
Nearly five dozen defense attorneys, paralegals and others billed for work on the case, the records show. One attorney charged $792,000 in fees and at least four other lawyers billed more than $500,000 each ? all for pretrial work.
The University of California paid the fees out of its publicly funded pocket. UCLA said in a statement Wednesday that the expense was justified.
"We defended ourselves and our faculty member as was our right and obligation, using funds in a systemwide self-insurance program," it said.
---------------------------------------------
REMOVING GLOVES AND OTHER PROTECTIVE EQUIPMENT
Tags: us_IA, laboratory, discovery, response
One of the things highlighted in the news this week is the risks of contamination from removing??doffing??personal protective equipment. ?Meticulous removal, or doffing, of PPE is as important as its meticulous donning,? wrote infectious disease physician Amesh A. Adalja in ?Ebola Lessons We Need To Learn From Dallas.?
Most chemists don?t need to fear Ebola, but they do wear PPE to protect from chemical exposure. I asked Iowa State University lab safety specialist Ryan Wyllie and biosafety specialist Amy Helgerson what chemistry researchers should keep in mind when removing their PPE.
---------------------------------------------
METH MAKING BLAMED FOR MUNCIE MOTEL FIRE
Tags: us_IN, public, fire, response, meth_lab
MUNCIE, Ind. (AP) ? Authorities are blaming methamphetamine makers for starting a fire at a Muncie motel.
Muncie Fire Department investigator Robert Mead says crews found items associated with manufacturing meth after the fire Saturday night at the Budget Motel on the city's south side.
Mead tells The Star Press (http://tspne.ws/1v53nFX">http://tspne.ws/1v53nFX ) that the chemical reaction from the meth ingredients started the fire, which gutted the room and damaged part of the motel's exterior and roof.
Mead says no injuries were reported and that the meth makers had fled before emergency crews arrived.
---------------------------------------------
METH CITY: NEIGBOURS TELL OF DEVASTATION OF BACKYARD DRUG COOKS
Tags: Australia, public, follow-up, environmental, meth_lab
Ian and Samantha King still regret renting out their Bertram home.
They cannot let their children play barefoot in the yard because of tiny shards of glass that still litter their lawn more than two years after an exploding methamphetamine laboratory tore apart their Lilac Pass house.
?A friend called saying our house was in flames, that a big fireball blasted out the front window and the whole roof kind of collapsed in on itself,? Mr King said.
---------------------------------------------
HAZMAT UNITS RESPOND TO INDUSTRIAL ACCIDENT AT MIDLAND BUSINESS
Tags: us_TX, industrial, release, injury, unknown_chemical
Hazmat officials responded to an industrial accident Wednesday afternoon that put a man in the hospital, according to a city official.
Midland emergency personnel responded at about 5:27 p.m. Wednesday to AES Drilling Fluids in the 4000 block of Business 20.
A man at the facility came into contact with a chemical in the biocide group, according to a city official. Noone else was exposed to the dangerous chemical, and the incident was quickly contained.
The man was transported to Midland Memorial Hospital to be checked by medical staff, but he is in stable condition, the official said.
---------------------------------------------
EMPLOYEES AT YEAGER AIRPORT "DECONTAMINATED" AFTER EXPOSURE TO U
Tags: us_WV, transportation, release, response, unknown_chemical
According to Airport Director Richard Atkinson, when airport employees investigated an unattended bag sitting in the terminal, the bag released an unknown chemical that caused symptoms similar to tear gas.
Two employees drove themselves to a hospital, while two more were treated by HAZMAT teams at the scene. According to Atkinson, the bag is believed to have been in the terminal since yesterday, Oct. 14, and probably came aboard a United or Delta flight. Security video is currently being reviewed to find who left the bag.
13 News reporters at the scene say National Guard, HAZMAT, troopers, Charleston Police, and the Kanawha County Sheriff's Office bomb squad were on the scene.
Flights are running as usual, but are being unloaded in an area away from the main terminal. According to the State Journal, information is being collected from all incoming passengers "out of an abundance of caution."
Authorities stress that the incident at Yeager Airport is in no way related to Ebola
---------------------------------------------
5 EXPOSED TO AMMONIA LEAK AT FROZEN-FOOD WAREHOUSE
Tags: us_FL, industrial, release, injury, ammonia
MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. -
Five people were exposed to ammonia from a leak at a frozen-food warehouse in northwest Miami-Dade County.
Miami-Dade Fire Rescue said its hazardous materials teams were called to Southeast Frozen Foods near Northeast Sixth Avenue and Northeast 183rd Street on Wednesday morning.
Hazmat teams were able to cap the leak.
All five people were taken to a hospital for further evaluation.
---------------------------------------------
TEXAS A&M STUDENT IN CRITICAL CONDITION AFTER INGESTING SODIUM CYANIDE
Tags: us_TX, education, release, death, cyanide
TEXAS A&M - A 20-year-old Texas A&M student is in critical condition after ingesting sodium cyanide. The chemical releases hydrogen cyanide gas, a highly toxic chemical asphyxiant that interferes with the body's ability to use oxygen and exposure can be deadly.
University police and the College Station Fire Department's Hazmat Team were called to Rudder Plaza around 3:30 p.m.
A Texas A&M ambulance transported the student to St. Joseph Regional Health Center.
The Bryan Fire Department's Hazmat Team responded to the hospital. Tim Ottinger with St Joes says Bryan FD set up special, inflatable tents outside the hospital where they could decontaminate the student before admitting him to the ER. Six emergency workers who treated him were also decontaminated and held for observation.
The entrance to the ER was blocked off and the hospital was put on diversion until 6:40 p.m. That means no other ambulances could be sent there during that time.
Texas A&M officials tell News 3 the University did not issue a code maroon because, in their words, there was no imminent danger. The University says first responders were able to secure the scene and keep students, faculty and staff at a safe distance.
---------------------------------------------
SECOND TEXAS WORKER WITH EBOLA TOOK FLIGHT BEFORE FALLING ILL
Tags: us_MA, public, discovery, response
Frieden said the critical period at Presbyterian was the first three days of Duncan?s care at Presbyterian before he was confirmed to have Ebola and before the CDC team arrived in Dallas ? Sept. 28, 29 and 30. Both Pham and Vinson had extensive contact with Duncan at that time, and both had interacted with him while he was producing a large amount of fluids from vomiting and diarrhea.
Although officials have not yet determined how the two nurses became infected, they were focusing on their use of personal protective equipment, known as PPE.
?We see a lot of variability in the use of personal protective equipment, and when our team arrived, the same day the case was diagnosed, we noticed, for example, that some health care workers were putting on three or four layers of protective equipment in the belief that this would be more protective,? Frieden said. ?But in fact by putting on more layers of gloves or other protective clothing, it becomes much harder to put them on and much harder to take them off, and the risk of contamination during the process of taking these gloves off gets much higher.?
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