Shortly after 6 pm, on June 2, 2011, an atmospheric storage tank within the amine regeneration unit exploded. A fireball split the tank open and killed four (4) workers. The sole survivor sustained severe burns and suffered life-changing injuries. The force of the explosion ejected the five-ton steel tank roof over 180 feet through…...
Last week EPA updated its National Compliance Initiative: Reducing Accidental Releases at Industrial and Chemical Facilities data and included an updated photo… Is this another “shot across the bow” to the ammonia refrigeration industry? They also updated their data with their 2019 Inspections:… Membership Required You must be a member to access this content.View Membership...
So much media coverage of the explosion in Northwest Houston on January 24, 2020. It is assumed that the explosion was caused by a propylene leak, a flammable gas that most people had never heard of before the explosion. What is so sad is that some politicians are jumping on board this tragedy and calling…...
The corrections concern the following regulations and standards:… Membership Required You must be a member to access this content.View Membership LevelsAlready a member? Log in here...
In November 2019 a manager, 32, of a restaurant, a national chain, was overcome by chlorine gas and died. The investigation established that a worker at the restaurant spilled a “cleaner” on the floor during the day. Then later that night, a different employee started to clean the floor with a “floor cleaner”. The mixture…...
A client has allowed me to share work I did several years ago when OSHA’s GHS threw a wrench into the flammable liquids world! There was so much confusion between Class and Category of flammable liquids, and during an engineering review, it was discovered that the engineering group had made a conversion error when going…...
When most ordinary people hear the term “Hazardous Location” many conjure images of a dangerous location associated with typical hazards; however, when a safety engineer or engineer from the process industries hear the phrase we immediately elvate our antenna and sit up and pay close attention to what is being said. But for those outside…...
In 2014, the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission (OSHRC) issued a judgment on an OSHA case, and in the case, they made it clear that “magnitude” matters in lockout/tagout (LOTO). But for some reason, this piece of data is absent from many machine-specific LOTO procedures and OSHA always takes issue with this oversight. So…...
In 2013, we discussed the OSHA and NFPA requirements for “identifying fire extinguishers” in Fire Extinguishers… Did you know they have to be identified? In that article, we touched on the OSHA and NFPA requirements for how fire extinguisher LOCATION(s) (not the actual fire extinguishers) are to be identified. But how many of us see…...
What do you get when you have no “qualified/competent” person on site who fully understands the implementation of a Confined Space program AND OSHA’s eTool Industry page is being read literally by the unqualified worker? The answer: SERIOUS PRCS PROBLEMS! I had a smile on my face the entire time I was thinking about how…...
With year 2020 already claiming 7 lives inside PRCSs within the USA, I have to ask the question: Has OSHA’s Permit-Required Confined Space standard meet its goal? In OSHA’s Preamble for 1910.146, published in 1993, OSHA stated: OSHA has determined that permit spaces pose significant risks to employees (62 fatalities and 12,643 injuries and illnesses annually) and estimates that compliance…...
Why is this article posted in the Permit-Required Confined Space section of the website? Because there seem to be a large number of safety professionals that are under the impression that ANY occupational hazard can turn a confined space into a Permit-Required Confined Space. Noise is a recognized occupational hazard – I think we can…...
