It is Monday, May 18, 2009 and firefighters are still battling flames at Sunoco’s refinery and petrochemical complex at Marcus Hook, Pennsylvania. A suspected Ethylene leak caused a massive explosion and fire in a unit in the refinery and petrochemical complex on Sunday night. Luckily, no casualties have been reported. Sunoco reportedly operates the Marcus … Read more
Running an industrial manufacturing plant in these days is tough. First, you have to meet all the production and cost targets, whereas you are not allowed to hire more hands (due to the slowing economy), or to have any safety violations or incidents, nor any environmental issues. With shrinking budgets and an equally shrinking manpower, … Read more
In Aug 2008, there was an explosion in a propane storage facility, located in the midst of a residential area in Toronto. There were two fatalities including that of a firefighter. The explosion was so huge it was very frightening and the subsequent fire was deadlier. Here’s a link to the video on YouTube http://in.youtube.com/watch?v=XCsNcwpYjUs … Read more
On June 3, 2008, there was a large explosion in a natural gas processing station on Varanus island near Western Australia. The investigation report that was released last week, points to poor maintenance as being the leading cause of the accident. It seems that the company that maintained the pipeline and associated infrastructure neglected maintenance … Read more
