Dust Explosions and Fires Continue Nationwide

Until the Secretary of Labor enacts a comphrehensive OSHA workplace standard  where combustible dusts are present, dust explosions and fires will continue at an unbridled rate.

A powerful sawdust explosion shook a building and started a fire at a furniture facility off U.S. 29 Tuesday morning, but left minimal damage and no injuries.

Source: !domain via watermon

After a two year investigation, the Chemical Safety Board  submitted a report to the Department of Labor in November 2006, concerning combustible dust hazards and the prevelance of explosions, fires, injuries, and fatalities that occur in a wide spectrum of industries.

Top federal safety officials urged the Labor Department in 2006 to adopt critical regulations to prevent deadly dust explosions-- like the one suspected in the deadly blast in a Georgia sugar plant last Thursday-- but the government has failed to do so.

Source: insurancejournal.com via watermon

Additionally, as recent as last week in a letter to Secretary of Labor Elaine L. Chao, Congressman George Miller (D-CA), Chairman on Education and Labor also requested her  to act in providing workplace standards in combustible dust environments.

I am writing to ask you to take immediate steps to issue a standard to prevent combustible dust explosions, as recommended to your agency by the Chemical Safety Board (CSB) in November 2006.

Source: house.gov via watermon

Closer to the site of the Savannah dust explosion, Senators Johnny Isakson (R-GA) and Patty Murray (D-WA), who are ranking members of the Senate Subcommittee on Employment and Workplace Safety have also sent urgent  pleas to the Secretary of Labor Elaine L. Chao concerning a prompt response so future catastrophes can be avoided.

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senators Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., and Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., today sent a letter to the U.S. Secretary of Labor and the interim executive of the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board, urging them to begin a comprehensive investigation of the Feb. 7 explosion at the Imperial Sugar refinery in Savannah, Ga.

Source: isakson.senate.gov via watermon

Interesting enough, a two year investigation has already been completed by the Chemical Safety Board concerning dust explosions and now is the time to act with a comphrehensive regulatory framework concerning process mangement, hazard communication, and training concerning dust hazards . OSHA an agency under the umbrella of the Department of Labor, is not tasked with finding root causes of explosions like CSB, instead these regulators seek out regulatory infractions. Ironically,other than an OSHA Grain Handling Standard there are no comphrehensive regulations concerning most industries that generate  combustible dust hazards, except a general duty clause. Meanwhile, more dust explosions and fires continue in the nation's  workplace.

Fire closes Rice Lake

manufacturing plant 1/30/2008

Firefighters could see smoke emanating from a chip and dust collection chute when they arrived, which lead them to the source of the blaze located in a western storage silo. Flames also spread into an interior machine room in the main plant.

Source: zwire.com via watermon

Coal dust sends firefighters to Clinton ADM plant Friday, December 21, 2007

The fire started when some coal dust near a boiler in the co-generation plant began to smolder, said company spokesman David Weintraub.

Source: qctimes.com via watermon

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