A chemical plant manufacturing basic organic chemicals was partly flooded when the reactors were being washed. The washing water (acrylic emulsions) got mixed with the flood water due to the backflow of the water in the pipeline and in the[...]
At a chemical facility, an explosion and fire occurred around 5 pm inside a laboratory on the first floor of a 4-storey, 400-m² building. The personnel were evacuated and the internal emergency plan activated. Air samples extracted from the premises[...]
Located in an industrial park, a warehouse storing 1,300 tonnes of finished phytosanitary products was flooded following dike failure. The facility was operating with 8 employees and its warehousing activity spanned 3,600 m² with an average height of 7 m[...]
A site manufacturing explosives was flooded following heavy rains. The products involved are not sensitive to water. A 15 hectare marshland located upstream to the site serves as an outfall for water overflowing from neighbouring lands. A 150 m³/h lift pump[...]
Heavy rains together with several breaks in RHONE River dikes caused the flooding of a warehouse containing agro-pharmaceutical products. The building housed 3 storage cells 480 m² in size, each capable of containing 330 tonnes of merchandise over a 7-m height[...]
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.[...]
