OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #595587
CAUSTIC,PPE,POTASH,EXPLOSION,CHEMICAL BURN,SPILL,TANK,PRESSURE RELEASE,CHEMICAL,HIGH TEMPERATURE
Event description
Employee dies after being splashed by hot caustic chemicals
Investigation abstract
On February 20, 1990, Employee #1 was working alone near a stripping tank that c ontained 1,200 gallons of hot caustic chemicals heated to 220 degrees F. The lid flew up and released approximately 50 to 100 gallons of potassium hydroxide ove r various parts of his body. A "burp" inside the tank occurred due to several fa ctors. Another employee, who was working in another area, heard a "muted explosi on" and ran to help Employee #1 until EMS arrived and transported him to the hos pital. Employee #1 suffered 2nd- and 3rd-degree burns over 68 percent of his bod y. He was later flown to a burn center, where he lived for approximately 3 weeks before he died of septicemia.
Victims (2)
-
#1 Fatality Age 47 M
- Nature of injury
- 5
- Part of body
- 19
- Event type
- 14
- Source
- 9
- Occupation code
- 999
- Human factor
- 20
- Environmental factor
- 9
- Hazardous substance
- 2140
- Task assigned
- 1
-
#981 Degree 0 Age 0
- Nature of injury
- 0
- Part of body
- 0
- Event type
- 0
- Source
- 0
- Occupation code
- 0
- Human factor
- 0
- Environmental factor
- 0
- Task assigned
- 0
Codes shown verbatim from OSHA's accident-investigation database. A human-readable decoder is coming in a future release once the accident_lookup2 dictionary is loaded.