105,313Records 71,083Employers 85,290Hospitalizations 27,770Amputations 2015-01-01 2025-10-31
Safety Incidents OSHA Severe Injury Reports · 2015–2025

OSHA Accident Investigation · Summary #968511

HYDROGEN,STATIC ELECTRICITY,EAR,EXPLOSION,HEARING LOSS,HIGH PRESSURE,TANK

Event
HYDROGEN,STATIC ELECTRICITY,EAR,EXPLOSION,HEARING LOSS,HIGH PRESSURE,TANK
Linked inspection
No inspection record linked to this accident's victims.
Summary number
968511
Report ID
953220

Event description

Employees experience ringing in ears after tank explosion

Investigation abstract

Static electricity ignited a hydrogen and air mixture that had accumulated at th e top of a digester tank. The tank exploded because of excess overpressure. Empl oyees #1 and #2 subsequently experienced ringing in the ears.

Victims (2)

  1. #1 Non-hospitalized injury Age 34 M

    Nature of injury
    14
    Part of body
    6
    Event type
    14
    Source
    47
    Occupation code
    585
    Human factor
    1
    Environmental factor
    17
    Hazardous substance
    8130
    Task assigned
    1
  2. #2 Non-hospitalized injury Age 54 M

    Nature of injury
    14
    Part of body
    6
    Event type
    14
    Source
    47
    Occupation code
    587
    Human factor
    1
    Environmental factor
    17
    Hazardous substance
    8130
    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.