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Chemical Safety Headlines From Google
Wednesday, October 19, 2016 at 7:48:29 AM
A membership benefit 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 (14 articles)
UNIVERSITY PROF. RECOVERING AFTER CHEMICAL EXPLOSION
Tags: us_nd, laboratory, explosion, injury, unknown_chemical
BUFFALO MAN SEEKS COMPENSATION FOLLOWING LITHIUM-ION BATTERY LAPTOP EXPLOSION
Tags: us_my, fire, public, follow-up, batteries
FIRE IN TLS LAB SHUTS DOWN CLASSES FOR THE DAY
Tags: us_ct, laboratory, fire, response, unknown_chemical
LITHIUM-ION BATTERY FIRE THREATENS MTD FACILITY IN SANTA BARBARA
Tags: us_ca, industrial, fire, injury, batteries
EPA BEGINS $3-MILLION CLEANUP AT SITE OF MAYWOOD MAGNESIUM FIRE
Tags: us_ca, industrial, follow-up, environmental, other_chemical
OIL-SOAKED RAGS CAN BE A FIRE HAZZARD HOUSEHOLD CHEMICAL SAFETY
Tags: us_mo, public, fire, response, other_chemical
FATAL EXPLOSION HITS BASF‰??S LUDWIGSHAFEN SITE
Tags: Germany, industrial, explosion, death, solvent
PUTTING A HUMAN COST ON ENDOCRINE DISRUPTORS
Tags: public, discovery, environmental, ag_chems, drugs, pharmaceutical
HAZMAT TEAM CALLED TO DEAL WITH FAULTY ZAMBONI
Tags: Canada, public, release, response, carbon_monoxide
HAZMAT CALL PROMPTS 911 CALL CENTER EVACUATION
Tags: us_GA, public, release, injury, irritant
CHEMICAL COMPANIES LIKE HONEYWELL WORKING ON MAKING COOLING SYSTEMS CLIMATE-FRIENDLY ‰?? TECH2
Tags: industrial, discovery, response
TOP LOBBY FIRM EYES NEW CHEMICAL LAW AS BIG BUSINESS DRIVER
Tags: us_WA, industrial, discovery, environmental
AT LEAST ONE DEAD IN EXPLOSION AT GERMAN BASF CHEMICAL PLANT
Tags: Germany, industrial, explosion, death, unknown_chemical
POLICE: 3 PEOPLE HOSPITALIZED AFTER EXPLOSION AT GLENVILLE ASPHALT COMPANY
Tags: us_NY, industrial, explosion, injury, asphalt, diesel, kerosene
---------------------------------------------
UNIVERSITY PROF. RECOVERING AFTER CHEMICAL EXPLOSION
Tags: us_nd, laboratory, explosion, injury, unknown_chemical
Dickinson, ND ‰?? A Dickinson State University chemistry professor is recovering from his injuries after what university officials are calling a small explosion earlier this month.
Students were evacuated from Murphy Hall on the DSU campus.
While Professor Ken Pierce was preparing a classroom demonstration in the chemistry lab, an incident occurred, resulting the explosion.
Pierce suffered injuries that were not life-threatening. He was initially transported to CHI St. Alexius Health in Dickinson before being transferred to Bismarck, according to a statement from DSU.
No students were injured in the incident. Three students indicated they were experiencing ringing in their ears due to the loud noise. They were evaluated and released by paramedics.
A message went out to students and personnel to evacuate the building, saying it was ‰??not a drill.‰??
---------------------------------------------
BUFFALO MAN SEEKS COMPENSATION FOLLOWING LITHIUM-ION BATTERY LAPTOP EXPLOSION
Tags: us_my, fire, public, follow-up, batteries
BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB) ‰?? Nick Jones was sitting on his couch like any ordinary Monday night when the unthinkable happened.
‰??My computer started to make a weird noise next to me on the couch it was off and charging then all of a sudden it started to pop and explode and there was this loud noise,‰?? said Nicholas Jones of Buffalo.
He says within a matter of seconds, the couch was on fire.
‰??I put the fire out on the couch and after the fire was out the battery cells inside the computer started to explode,‰?? said Jones.
Jones said that then ignited the rug and chair resulting in over $1,800 worth of damage. He also suffered first degree chemical burns on his hands and arms.
‰??I think stuff sort of sprayed at me cause I sort of went like this and I think that‰??s how I got the burns on my arm,‰?? said Jones.
Jones said he ordered the replacement lithium-ion battery from Amazon for his Compaq Presario CQ57 laptop.
---------------------------------------------
FIRE IN TLS LAB SHUTS DOWN CLASSES FOR THE DAY
Tags: us_ct, laboratory, fire, response, unknown_chemical
Just after 2 p.m. today, the UConn Fire Department responded to a call this afternoon for a fire in a basement laboratory of the Torrey Life Science Building (TLS). Everyone was evacuated and all classes for the remainder of the day were cancelled according to a UConnALERT sent at 2:59 p.m.
‰??The fire is out at Torrey and there were no injuries,‰?? Spokesperson Stephanie Reitz said. ‰??We did call in mutual aid from Tolland and the cause has not yet been determined.‰??
‰??The fire alarm went off around 2:15-2:20 or so,‰?? seventh-semester Ecology and Evolutionary Biology major Kwasi Wrensford said. ‰??There was a fire on the ground floor in one of the laboratories. My class was on the first floor in one of the laboratories‰?|as the alarm went off we caught a whiff of the smoke.‰??
Fifth-semester molecular and cell biology major Madie Adams was also in the building at the time of the incident.
‰??[The] firemen started arriving and told us it was an actual fire and we moved away and I went up to the physics building so I could look down and the whole ground floor is filled with smoke,‰?? Adams said. ‰??It looks like the fire started in the lab on the very right side of the ground floor if you are looking at TLS from the North.‰??
Adams said that students were blocked from re-enetering the building.
---------------------------------------------
LITHIUM-ION BATTERY FIRE THREATENS MTD FACILITY IN SANTA BARBARA
Tags: us_ca, industrial, fire, injury, batteries
SANTA BARBARA, Calif. - Two Metropolitan Transit District employees received medical attention after being exposed to smoke and dry chemical powder from a bank of lithium-ion batteries that caught on fire Tuesday morning.
Both employees were seen by paramedics on scene and declined further treatment. However, their quick actions may have very well prevented the fire from reaching its full potential.
The incident occurred at 9:30 a.m. MTD employees noticed smoke coming from the batteries, and attempted to put the fire out using dry chemical extinguishers and a Class D Metal extinguisher.
Santa Barbara City firefighters and the Hazardous Material Unit were dispatched to the scene to assist with the highly reactive and flammable material. The fire was eventually put out by two Class D Metal fire extinguisher. These extinguishers were designed specifically to suppress flammable metal fires.
Fire investigators say the fire appears to have been caused by a small amount of water leaking through the metal roof and onto the batteries, which may have caused an external short between the battery terminals.
---------------------------------------------
EPA BEGINS $3-MILLION CLEANUP AT SITE OF MAYWOOD MAGNESIUM FIRE
Tags: us_ca, industrial, follow-up, environmental, other_chemical
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency launched a cleanup this week of the Maywood metal yard that burned down in June, part of a two-month waste removal project at the closed business.
The EPA warned that clearing out hazardous debris may send noxious odors into nearby neighborhoods, an irritating reminder of a fire that displaced hundreds of residents and revived fears about the proximity of industrial sites to homes in southeast Los Angeles County.
In the early morning of June 14, flames tore through scrap metal recycler Panda International Trading Co. and a precious metals recycler operating on a portion of the company‰??s Fruitland Avenue property, Sokor Metals.
Investigators said at the time that about 10,000 pounds of magnesium fed the fire, which stubbornly burned for more than a day. Firefighters struggled to contain the flames because water would trigger explosions with magnesium. County fire officials had to use a dry chemical extinguishing agent.
---------------------------------------------
OIL-SOAKED RAGS CAN BE A FIRE HAZZARD HOUSEHOLD CHEMICAL SAFETY
Tags: us_mo, public, fire, response, other_chemical
SPRINGFIELD, Mo. Investigators have determined that stain-soaked rags caused the massive fire in a Taney County warehouse last week.
The public information officer for the Central Taney County Fire Protection District says a remodeling crew at VHC Brands threw the rags in a trash can and the fire started by combustion; the rags should have been discarded in an airtight container.
Firefighters say that can serve as a lesson to do-it-yourselfers who store oil-based wood stain and rags at their houses.
Nixa Fire Protection District Assistant Chief Whitney Weaver says linseed oil is very common for staining projects, but as it dries, it can turn rags to torches.
‰??It could be hours, it could be never. It depends on how those rags are disposed of,‰?? said Weaver.
He says if you wad up a wet, stain-soaked rag and throw it aside, it can spontaneously combust.
‰??It basically heats to an ignition point. It causes so much heat as it evaporates so quickly‰?| Most of our products that we use now are polyesters, or plastics, and when those heat up, they eventually start to melt, and can just catch fire,‰?? Weaver said.
---------------------------------------------
FATAL EXPLOSION HITS BASF‰??S LUDWIGSHAFEN SITE
Tags: Germany, industrial, explosion, death, solvent
A huge explosion and fire at BASF‰??s Ludwigshafen, Germany, site‰??one of the world‰??s largest chemical complexes‰??killed two company firefighters. Another employee is missing. Eight other BASF staffers were seriously injured and 17 slightly injured from the fire, which broke out on the morning of Monday, Oct. 17.
The explosion and resultant fire occurred among pipelines that connect the firm‰??s harbor on the Rhine River to the Ludwigshafen complex. Maintenance work was being carried out on the pipelines, some of which carry ethylene and propylene, at the time of the explosion. The fire burned for more than 10 hours before it was extinguished.
BASF shut down the site‰??s two steam crackers and closed or reduced output from a further 18 or so other plants. BASF uses ethylene and propylene at the site to make a broad range of products including insulating materials, solvents, and paints.
‰??We are deeply saddened that employees have died and several have been injured. Our deepest sympathy lies with the affected people and their families,‰?? site manager Uwe Liebelt said.
Another explosion occurred at BASF‰??s Lampertheim, Germany, plastics additives plant on the same morning. Four workers were injured. BASF says the cause of that incident is not yet known. Production at the plant has been suspended.
Process safety incidents at BASF occurred at a rate of 2.1 and 2.2 per million working hours in 2014 and 2015, respectively, according to the firm.
CEFIC, a European chemicals trade association, has pledged its full support to BASF. ‰??Given the sheer scale of operations and people involved at such plants, unfortunately incidents can still happen from time to time,‰?? Director General Marco Mensink says.
---------------------------------------------
PUTTING A HUMAN COST ON ENDOCRINE DISRUPTORS
Tags: public, discovery, environmental, ag_chems, drugs, pharmaceutical
Long-term, low-level exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals costs the U.S. $340 billion in annual health care spending and lost wages, according to a study of epidemiological data (Lancet Diabetes Endocrinol. 2016, DOI: 10.1016/S2213-8587(16)30275-3).
These compounds, commonly found in consumer products and their packaging and associated with pharmaceutical and agricultural chemical use, can interfere with hormone function and contribute to the development of a variety of diseases and health problems.
The estimated costs equal roughly 2.3% of the U.S. gross domestic product. By comparison, earlier this year the team estimated that the same cost for the European Union is $217 billion, or about 1.3% of its gross domestic product (Andrology 2016, DOI: 10.1111/andr.12178).
---------------------------------------------
HAZMAT TEAM CALLED TO DEAL WITH FAULTY ZAMBONI
Tags: Canada, public, release, response, carbon_monoxide
Burlington‰??s Fire Department spent Sunday afternoon at the Arena at the Mainway Rec Centre for two calls not related to each other.
The first call was about an injured athlete and the second was about a carbon monoxide detector.
The arena was cleared, including the injured athlete, when the detector went off and the HazMat team responded and ventilated the building.
The source was a faulty Zamboni, which has been taken out of service.
---------------------------------------------
HAZMAT CALL PROMPTS 911 CALL CENTER EVACUATION
Tags: us_GA, public, release, injury, irritant
(SAVANNAH) The workweek starts with an evacuation of the very room where emergency calls are answered in Chatham County. A hazardous materials situation gets the blame for emptying the Emergency Communications Center in Savannah Monday morning. Savannah firefighters responded to the county facility just before 9:30 a.m. when communications personnel started complaining about eye, nose and throat irritations. 14 personnel were treated by emergency medical personnel on scene. Two of the individuals were transported to St. Joseph‰??s/Candler Hospital for further evaluation.
A suspected leak in the fire suppression system of the communications center forced the evacuation this morning of the Chatham County Annex at 295 Police Memorial Dr. Savannah Fire and Emergency Services(SFES) Hazmat crews entered the building and isolated the irritant to the fire suppression system. The chemical, Heptaflouropropane, is a compressed gas that is used to suppress fires in electronic equipment. ‰??It‰??s a irritant, causes some throat, eye irritation, uh, we had a couple people, uh, that actually got nauseous.‰?? said Mark Keller, Public Information Officer for SFES.
The Annex houses more than the 911 Call Center, scores of government employees work there. ‰?? This is a fully functional, um, police precinct, so we have police officers in and out of the building. We have civilian staff, such as clerical staff, um that work in this building as well. the Chatham County TAG office is housed here, and again, our emergency communications center staff is housed in this building as well.‰?? said Eunicia Baker, a public information officer for the Savannah-Chatham Metro Police Department.
---------------------------------------------
CHEMICAL COMPANIES LIKE HONEYWELL WORKING ON MAKING COOLING SYSTEMS CLIMATE-FRIENDLY ‰?? TECH2
Tags: industrial, discovery, response
U.S. chemical companies including Honeywell and Chemours Co are ramping up efforts to produce alternative coolants used in air-conditioners and refrigerators, following a global pact to reduce planet-warming greenhouse house gas emissions. On Saturday, some 150 nations struck a global agreement in Kigali, Rwanda, on ways to phase down hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) gases, which are currently used in air-cooling systems and refrigerators, and help curb the release of climate-warming emissions.
The accord is an amendment to the 1987 Montreal Protocol, which was aimed at stopping the depletion of the ozone layer. As part of a larger goal to globally reduce HFCs by 80 percent by 2047, signatories such as U.S., India and China have agreed to phase out the pollutants from cooling appliances starting 2019.
The agreement is a boon for chemical and equipment makers as it gives them ‰??clarity and certainty‰?? and will help speed up development and testing of HFC alternatives, which are already underway, Kevin Fay, executive director of the Alliance for Responsible Atmospheric Policy, a trade group that represents chemical and equipment manufacturers, said.
---------------------------------------------
TOP LOBBY FIRM EYES NEW CHEMICAL LAW AS BIG BUSINESS DRIVER
Tags: us_WA, industrial, discovery, environmental
Holland & Knight, one of Washington‰??s most lucrative lobby shops, has hired two former top congressional aides who helped draft a sweeping new law that changes the way the government regulates chemicals ‰?? a signal that K Street sees the law as an opportunity to capture new business.
Ben Dunham and Dimitri Karakitsos were once adversaries who are now working under the same roof. Dunham was a top adviser to the late senator Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.), after whom the law was named, and Karakitsos was his Republican counterpart, working as the senior staffer for the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. For five years starting in 2009, as their bosses fought over what the bill should include, Dunham and Karakitsos worked together to organize hearings, briefings and meetings with industry groups to weigh in on the measure. They drafted an early version of what would later become the basis of the legislation that became law in June.
---------------------------------------------
AT LEAST ONE DEAD IN EXPLOSION AT GERMAN BASF CHEMICAL PLANT
Tags: Germany, industrial, explosion, death, unknown_chemical
BASF, the world's biggest chemical company, said it now believed two of its employees died on Monday in an explosion and subsequent fire at its site in Ludwigshafen in Germany, where it is headquartered.
Six people were severely injured and two people are still missing, the company said in a statement.
The explosion occurred earlier on Monday, sending up plumes of smoke and prompting BASF to turn off some of its production facilities.
Black smoke rises from the scene of an explosion at the BASF chemical facility on October 17, 2016 in Ludwigshafen, Germany.
A fire that broke out following the blast sent up plumes of smoke, prompting BASF, the world's biggest chemicals company, and the city of Ludwigshafen to urge residents in the surrounding area to avoid going outside and to keep their windows and doors shut.
Measurements taken in the area so far have indicated no risk from toxic fumes, BASF said.
"We will of course do everything we can to clear the matter up," site chief Liebelt said.
---------------------------------------------
POLICE: 3 PEOPLE HOSPITALIZED AFTER EXPLOSION AT GLENVILLE ASPHALT COMPANY
Tags: us_NY, industrial, explosion, injury, asphalt, diesel, kerosene
GLENVILLE, N.Y. (NEWS10) ‰?? Fire officials say a tanker truck exploded at Mohawk Asphalt Emulsions Monday afternoon after workers were mixing chemicals for road construction.
‰??They were offloading a combination of diesel fuel and kerosene mixed with tar into a tanker truck and that‰??s what caught on fire,‰?? Thomas Corners Fire Department Chief Gregg Petricca said. ‰??I believe they were doing something to a valve on the tank and it created a spark and that‰??s what started the fire.‰??
Witnesses say just after 1 p.m. Monday, they heard four loud explosions then saw a plume of smoke filled the sky. Fire crews arrived just minutes after the first call went out and doused the fire with foam.
Police say three workers were injured in the explosion and fire, two of those were severely injured.
All of the workers have been transported to the hospital. The conditions of the workers are not known at this time.
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