Inspection Detail

Inspection: 106102700 - Fluor Daniel

Inspection Information - Office: Mobile Area Office

Investigation Summary

Fluor Daniel is an engineering and construction company with approximately 30,000 employees worldwide. Since 1985, Fluor Daniel maintained employees at a G.E. manufacturing facility in Burkville, Alabama. Fluor Daniel was responsible for the initial construction of the Burkville facility between 1985 and 1987. Since that time its employees were involved in various additions and modifications to the plant and also provided on-site contract maintenance services. Fluor Daniel employees were not directly involved with G.E. production. In May 1996, Fluor Daniel had a couple hundred employees at the Burkville facility. The Burkville facility consisted of one waste handling plant and five manufacturing plants, including a resin plant and a phosgene plant. The resin plant was a six-story, open-sided structure, approximately 100 feet wide and 400 feet long, which sat approximately 50 feet east of the phosgene plant. A street separated the two plants, but they were connected physically by a pipe rack, which held phosgene-conveying pipes. On May 22, 1996, a number of Fluor Daniel employees were working on the second-floor mezzanine of the resin plant, removing a caustic line so that they could install a heat exchanger for the caustic scrubber system. While they were working, low levels of phosgene vented back through the caustic line. After the phosgene release was detected, the Fluor Daniel employees evacuated the resin plant. Neither Fluor Daniel nor G.E. provided emergency escape respirators for Fluor Daniel employees in the resin plant, and none of the Fluor Daniel employees who evacuated the plant were wearing respirators. After evacuation, G.E.'s on-site physician examined 11 Fluor Daniel employees and referred them to a hospital in Montgomery, Alabama, where they were examined further and provided prophylactic treatment. Eight employees stayed overnight for observation and were released the next day

Keywords: PHOSGENE, VAPOR, CAUSTIC, INHALATION, LOCKOUT, ACCIDENTAL DISCHARGE, CHEMICAL, RESPIRATOR