OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #670943
INADEQUATE MAINT,INHALATION,CHLORINE,CHLORINE ROOM,GAS LEAK,TOXIC FUMES,OVEREXPOSURE
Event description
Employee overexposed to chlorine gas
Investigation abstract
At 10:15 a.m. on July 30, 1986, Employee #1 was taking water samples to the Boon epartment for help at approximately 10:47 a.m. Employee #1 later stated that not hing seemed very clear until he was in the Warrick County Hospital emergency roo m in Boonville. The building consists of two rooms. The control room is concrete block construction, 88 in. by 96 in. by 104 ft high with an outside steel door and ventilation. The chlorine room is concrete block construction, 120 in. by 96 in. by 104 in. high with an outside steel door, a disconnected chlorinator and electrical system with an outside light/exhaust for a switch, and a corroded, re sted pump motor with rust on all inside walls. ville water treatment plant. He was told by the plant operator that the indicato r lights on the control panel indicated that a well field in eastern Spencer Cou nty was shutting on and off. Employee #1 told the plant operator that he would g o to the water well field to check the problem. He then fueled his truck and tra veled to the site, arriving at approximately 10:35 a.m. He was alone at the site . He left his truck, opened the door of the control room toward him, and smelled chlorine gas. Employee #1 then opened the door of the chlorine gas room. He ran back to his truck, moved it as far as he could, and called the Boonville Fire D
Victim
-
#1 Hospitalized Age 47 M
- Nature of injury
- 2
- Part of body
- 28
- Event type
- 8
- Source
- 19
- Occupation code
- 694
- Human factor
- 19
- Environmental factor
- 7
- Hazardous substance
- 0640
- Task assigned
- 1
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.