Abstract: At approximately 9:45 a.m. on January 16, 1992, Employee #1, of Paradise Chevrolet, was using an oxyacetylene gas supplied cutting torch southwest of the body shop. Employee #1 said that the body shop manager had told him to use the torch to cut a hole in the top of some drums to ventilate them. Employee #1 said that when he started to cut the hole in one drum, it exploded and his clothes ignited. Employee #1 did not know that the drum had contained a flammable liquid. According to a witness, Employee #1 had been cutting some bars and laid the torch atop the drum, which then exploded. Employee #1 was taken to the Sherman Oaks Medical Center with second- and third-degree burns over 60 percent of his body.