09:10
Faizan
Industrial disasters can be devastating. Many of us think 'we've all gone Health & Safety mad!', but it doesn't take long to find a multitude of situations where people have lost lives due to lack of Health & Safety precautions being in place in industry.
So what constitutes an industrial disaster?
An industrial disaster can be caused accidentally, through negligence, or through incompetence. There doesn't always have to be fault, but as we become more Health & Safety aware, it's more common for someone, or a group, to have to face accusations after a disaster. If there are high levels of damage, or injury caused, or loss of life, and the cause is related to the business of an industrial organisation, then the tragedy would be referred to as an industrial disaster. Prior to the industrial revolution of the 18th Century, there were not the same levels of disaster other than from causes of nature.
Let's take a look at some of the worst industrial disasters through time, and the gravity of the consequences of each.
Silo Explosion - Oppau, Germany, September 1921. A plant which had been producing ammonium sulphate prior to WW1, had to start producing ammonium nitrate, as it could be made without imported sulphur. Both types were stacked in a silo, which then turned into a plaster like substance under its own weight. Workers couldn't get at the mixture to break it up with pick axes for danger of being buried under the collapsing weight. In order to break up the mixture, the workers used some dynamite charges.
The explosive nature of ammonium nitrate was well known, but this procedure was in fact a common one in the industry. Despite a similarly caused disaster occurring in Germany 2 months earlier, the warning wasn't heeded and the practice continued. At Oppau, the scale of devastation was so bad that 300km away in Munich a loud bang was heard, 30km away traffic had to stop from so much shattered glass, and a pressure wave tore roofs off house up to 25km away. In the town 80% of homes were destroyed leaving 6,500 homeless, 2000 people were injured and 500-600 people killed, including all those working in the vicinity.
Nuclear Disaster - in 1986, a flawed reactor, teamed with insufficiently trained personnel, led to the Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster, which saw 2 people killed from the explosions on site, and 28 people died within a few weeks due to acute radiation poisoning, and 19 died in later years, although the connection to the disaster can't be proved. The steam explosion and fires which occurred released 5% of the radioactive reactor core into the local environment. They were still trying to put the fires out after 10 days, when they could no longer use water after the first ½ day for fear of flooding the other reactors, they dropped sand, clay, lead etc. onto the burning core from helicopters to try and stop the blaze and release of radioactive particles.
So what constitutes an industrial disaster?
An industrial disaster can be caused accidentally, through negligence, or through incompetence. There doesn't always have to be fault, but as we become more Health & Safety aware, it's more common for someone, or a group, to have to face accusations after a disaster. If there are high levels of damage, or injury caused, or loss of life, and the cause is related to the business of an industrial organisation, then the tragedy would be referred to as an industrial disaster. Prior to the industrial revolution of the 18th Century, there were not the same levels of disaster other than from causes of nature.
Let's take a look at some of the worst industrial disasters through time, and the gravity of the consequences of each.
Silo Explosion - Oppau, Germany, September 1921. A plant which had been producing ammonium sulphate prior to WW1, had to start producing ammonium nitrate, as it could be made without imported sulphur. Both types were stacked in a silo, which then turned into a plaster like substance under its own weight. Workers couldn't get at the mixture to break it up with pick axes for danger of being buried under the collapsing weight. In order to break up the mixture, the workers used some dynamite charges.
The explosive nature of ammonium nitrate was well known, but this procedure was in fact a common one in the industry. Despite a similarly caused disaster occurring in Germany 2 months earlier, the warning wasn't heeded and the practice continued. At Oppau, the scale of devastation was so bad that 300km away in Munich a loud bang was heard, 30km away traffic had to stop from so much shattered glass, and a pressure wave tore roofs off house up to 25km away. In the town 80% of homes were destroyed leaving 6,500 homeless, 2000 people were injured and 500-600 people killed, including all those working in the vicinity.
Nuclear Disaster - in 1986, a flawed reactor, teamed with insufficiently trained personnel, led to the Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster, which saw 2 people killed from the explosions on site, and 28 people died within a few weeks due to acute radiation poisoning, and 19 died in later years, although the connection to the disaster can't be proved. The steam explosion and fires which occurred released 5% of the radioactive reactor core into the local environment. They were still trying to put the fires out after 10 days, when they could no longer use water after the first ½ day for fear of flooding the other reactors, they dropped sand, clay, lead etc. onto the burning core from helicopters to try and stop the blaze and release of radioactive particles.
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