Imperial Sugar CEO John C. Sheptor is the latest in a long line of prominent figures to call for the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to speed up its plans to introduce a definitive combustible dust standard for US industry.
In a keynote speech at the AIHce 2012 conference in Indianapolis, Sheptor explained how the company recovered from the devastating February 2008 explosion at its Port Wentworth, Georgia, sugar refinery. Fourteen people died after more than 30 explosions ripped through the refinery, and dozens of employees were injured. Sheptor was in the plant at the time and survived only because he was protected by a fire wall, he said.
Sheptor said experts believe a failed bearing overheated and touched off the explosions in the plant. Today, any accumulation of a 1/32 inch layer or more of sugar dust triggers a shutdown of the production line and will be investigated by a committee, he said. It had taken time to transform the culture so employees would take action themselves when such conditions were found, he added, but that has now been accomplished.
“I am relatively pleased by my industry’s response,” he said. “Where I am most displeased is that we still do not have a standard from Washington. There needs to be a standard that educates on proper ways to manage combustible dust hazards.”
Earlier this year the Chemical Safety Board (CSB), following its review of the fatal metal dust explosions at the Hoeganaes plant in Tennessee, called for OSHA to develop and publish a proposed combustible dust standard within one year.
Since 1980, more than 450 accidents involving dust have killed nearly 130 workers and injured another 800-plus, according to Center for Public Integrity analysis of data compiled by OSHA and the CSB, and this is likely to be significantly understated given inconsistent reporting requirements.
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