OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #848440
AMERICAN LOUVER COMPANY
SKOKIE, IL·
Event description
Four employees sustain burns in heptane explosion
Investigation abstract
A base-line coating operation using heptane was being used to finish plastic lou vers for lighting. The pulley for the spray area's duct work fan came loose from the shaft. When the fan stopped operating, a build-up of vapors occurred in the duct. Eventually, the pulley slid completely off the shaft and was thrown out o f the duct tube, striking the duct wall and creating a spark and a resultant exp losion/fire. Employees #1, #2, and #3 were hospitalized and Employee #4 was inju red.
Victims (4)
-
#1 Hospitalized Age 25 M
- Nature of injury
- 4
- Part of body
- 2
- Event type
- 14
- Source
- 16
- Occupation code
- 999
- Human factor
- 14
- Environmental factor
- 10
- Task assigned
- 1
-
#2 Hospitalized Age 39 M
- Nature of injury
- 4
- Part of body
- 2
- Event type
- 14
- Source
- 16
- Occupation code
- 999
- Human factor
- 14
- Environmental factor
- 10
- Task assigned
- 1
-
#3 Hospitalized Age 24 M
- Nature of injury
- 4
- Part of body
- 2
- Event type
- 14
- Source
- 16
- Occupation code
- 999
- Human factor
- 14
- Environmental factor
- 10
- Task assigned
- 1
-
#4 Non-hospitalized injury Age 39 M
- Nature of injury
- 20
- Part of body
- 21
- Event type
- 14
- Source
- 46
- Occupation code
- 999
- Human factor
- 14
- Environmental factor
- 18
- 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.