VitalAccurateThinking

Plant Fire in Pasadena

Update 2: The 10 pm news reports the fire was out. Some other tid-bits I picked up. The worker who was burned was transported to Herman Hospital by ambulance. If it was a serious burn case, he would have been life flighted. The evening news also reported that the fire started when they were sampling the car and it was a very small leak. It looked a little bigger than just a small leak. I would like to know more details on this. All told, it was smaller than it could have been. Great job putting out the fire.

Update: The Chronicle has an updated story here. They finally name the compound in question: Diethylaluminum Chloride in the amount of 150,000 lbs. I was guessing Triethylaluminum, but this is actually worse. Having chlorine involved is a big deal. That is a gigantic amount of product and if there are adjacent rail cars, and the pictures seem to indicate there are, this could be a big incident. No wonder they are recommending closing the ship channel. I now feel worse for Albemarle than ever. When you close the Houston Ship Channel, that is bad, bad, bad.

Once again, the crack reporters at the Houston Chronicle are all over this story of a chemical plant fire at a Pasadena, Texas plant. This is not the plant Jim VAT works at, but close enough that Jim VAT knows what he is talking about.

First off, let me lend my support to the Albemarle plant in question. There are some good folks there and I hope the injured person has minor issues and fully recovers. No one wishes an incident like this on anyone. I know I do not.

Here are some of the lowlights from our local newspaper:

Firefighters continued battling a fire this evening at the Albemarle Corp. chemical plant in Pasadena that has sent one man to the hospital.

That's right, follow the Houston Chronicle template and report on injuries in the first line of the story even though you have very little information.

When the aluminum alkyls burn, it produces a white powder called aluminum oxide which is a common ingredient in deodorant, Hawkes said

Someone tell me that either Hawkes did not say that or that the Chronicle was not stupid enough to print it. More likely, Hawkes said it just to see if the media was stupid enough to report it. Guess the joke is on them. I'll have to remember that line the next time there is an aluminum fire. "Don't worry folks. That thick black smoke is nothing to bother with. When this is all over, we will have a big pile of harmless deodorant." Give me a break. This is an example of being technically correct, but totally diverting the point. I guess I should applaud the spokesperson for the skillful diversionary tactic.

The company's aluminum alkyls complex is the largest in the world. Products produced at the site include aluminum and magnesium alkyls, alkenyl succinic anhydride, orthoalkylates (DEA, MEA, DETDA) and fine precipitated aluminum hydroxides.

Nice cut and paste job Ann and Ruth. Wow! You have shown you can go to a web site and pull up some totally irrelevant information. Could you even name a metal alkyl? Just one please. Maybe the one involved in the fire. I bet I could guess which one. If I guess, could Ann or Ruth draw the chemical formula? I would bet money they could not without help from Google.

Clearly, Ann and Ruth have failed to follow the Chronicle template. They missed two important items: 1) what the chemicals are used to make and 2) what OSHA history the site has. Once I report them to the Chronicle editors, they will head back to "How to Bash the Chemical Industry" class again. Shame on you girls.

I guess the chemical industry should be thankful for the local media's lack of technical savvy. Their ignorance would truly be a blessing if they did not influence equally stupid politicians. That being said, the chemical industry owes it to their employees, stock holders and communities to minimize the risk in all their operations. That is the bottom line.

Does the media help or hurt in this effort? I say both. They put the pressure on management who at least attempt to stay out of the spot light. Unfortunately, this leads to controlling information rather than solving root causes. I support sharing information and solving problems rather than spin and band aids. In this way, the media spotlight does not help.

What would I like to see instead? That is a topic for another day.

posted by Jim VAT @ 9:13 PM