Explosions Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Explosions - Essay ExampleThe Imperial Sugar dust explosion occurred four years after the U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB)had conducted a require into the risks presented by dust explosions after three prior severe accidents in 2004. Unfortunately, all the recommendations the CSB made to theOccupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) had only been partly acted on e.g. the outdated methods and construction materials that added to the severity of the Port Wentworth fire could have been detected. On the other hand the BP Texas City Refinery disaster was the result of gross failure on the part of its management and workers. Rigot (2007) clearly outlines the Baker Panels findings on the incident. BPs US refineries did non comply with its own internal bear upon safety standards, process safety leadership was lacking and the work environment encouraged procedural noncompliance (7-15). Southwest Industrial Gases and CAI Inc. may have not directly been culpable for their explosi ons because of the difficulty to judge whether the causes were accidental or intentional. However, the Bastian Plating Companys poisonous gas incident was out of the question. The night-shift leader avoided all precautions. Secondly, it is unacceptable for a team leader in a chemical plant to unknowingly create hydrogen cyanide.With the level of expertise, technology and knowledge in the US, well-nigh industrial explosions are preventable. Rigot (2007) cites the major causes of explosion to be latent organizational weaknesses, lack of effective reporting and learning culture within organizations and focus on injury and illness statistics rather than on process safety by both organizations and OHSA. In conclusion, Davis and Hansen (2009) propose that companies need to perform consequence analyses for their facilities to prevent alike incidents from occurring in the future