The U.S. Chemical Safety Board has released their final report on a hazardous chemical release that happened in Atchison, Kansas, in 2016.
The incident at the MGPI Processing plant occurred when a delivery truck driver mistakenly pumped the wrong chemical into a holding tank. The resulting chemical reaction produced a cloud of chlorine gas that hospitalized six people and forced more than 140 to seek medical attention.
Chemical Safety Board investigator Lucy Tyler says they found that pipeline connections at the plant were too close, too similar, and poorly labeled. She says those factors greatly increased the chance of an incident.
“Many of the key lessons from our case study are examples on how facilities can modify their transfer equipment and processes to prevent an incident like this from occurring,” she says.
Since 2014, there have been eight similar incidents that have happened at other facilities across the country.
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