The RHONE river overflowed due to heavy rains and flooded a paper mill located in an industrial area. This site produced kraft paper pulp from softwood bleached with oxygen, hydrogen peroxide and chlorine dioxide also stores black liquor, fuel oil, methanol,[...]
On November 28, 2003, two cases of Legionnaire's Disease were recorded, the first symptoms of which dated back to the beginning of November. The dates of outbreak of the pathology, which were then staggered over time, revealed two distinct waves[...]
At a steel factory, a small ammonia (NH3) leak was observed during the day on a tap valve fitting (inner tap diam.: 8 mm) of a pipe connecting storage tanks in the hydrogen production unit. This gas was being used[...]
Fire-fighters battled for 45 min to contain the blaze at a 1,000-m² hangar belonging to a fruit farmer when a very powerful explosion rocked the building around 5 pm. The explosive mass involved was estimated at 300-500 kg of TNT.[...]
A phosphorus trichloride (PCl3) leak occurred in a chemical plant during an iso container filling operation. The operator stopped the loading operation when the control room noticed a cloud of PCl3 and hydrogen chloride (HCl) being released into the atmosphere.[...]
At a chemical plant, a large cloud of phosphorus trichloride (PCl3) and hydrogen chloride was released during a degassing test conducted on a PCl3 iso-container damaged during an incident that same morning (ARIA 26003). The plant's internal emergency plan was[...]
In a chemical plant, 2 explosions occurred in a glyoxylic acid production line followed by a fire. The building in question housed a production unit for intermediate chemicals used in manufacturing antibiotics and crop protection products. The fire-fighters brought the[...]
A spill of 328 metric tons of heavy fuel oil happened in an Oil Terminal during the discharge of the product from a ship vessel to a storage tank. At 10.30 p.m. the discharge to storage tank No 375 was[...]
An explosion followed by fire occurred at 3.20 am in a plant's lubricant additive manufacturing facility located in a harbour-based industrial zone. The unit, experiencing an operational shutdown for the last 3 days, appeared to be empty of all additives at[...]
At a chemical site producing melamine, an accidental explosion occurred during restart of an industrial furnace powered by both natural gas and the residual gas from other units. The filters clogged by residual gas were regularly cleaned, which necessitated installation[...]
