|
The Flixborough disaster was an explosion at a chemical plant close to the village of Flixborough, North Lincolnshire, England, on 1 June 1974. It killed 28 people and seriously injured 36 out of a total of only 72 people on site at the time; from the devastation on site it was clear that had the explosion happened in normal office hours the casualty figures could have been much higher.〔〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.aria.developpement-durable.gouv.fr/wp-content/files_mf/FD_5611_flixborough_1974_ang.pdf )〕 A contemporary campaigner on process safety wrote "the shock waves rattled the confidence of every chemical engineer in the country".〔 The disaster involved (and may well have been caused by) a hasty modification. Mechanical engineering issues with the modification were overlooked by the managers (chemical engineers) who approved it, and the severity of the potential consequences of its failure was not appreciated. Flixborough led to a widespread public outcry over process plant safety. Together with the passage of the Health and Safety at Work Act in the same year it led to (and is often quoted in justification of) a more systematic approach to process safety in UK process industries, and – in conjunction with the Seveso disaster and the consequent EU 'Seveso directives' – to explicit UK government regulation of plant processing or storing large inventories of hazardous materials, currently (2014) by the COMAH (Control of Major Accident Hazards) Regulations. ==Overview== The chemical works, owned by Nypro UK (a joint venture between Dutch State Mines (DSM) and the British National Coal Board (NCB) had originally produced fertiliser from by-products of the coke ovens of a nearby steelworks. Since 1967, it had instead produced caprolactam, a chemical used in the manufacture of nylon 6. The caprolactam was produced from cyclohexanone. This was originally produced by hydrogenation of phenol, but in 1972 additional capacity was added built to a DSM design in which hot liquid cyclohexane was partially oxidised by compressed air. The plant was intended to produce 70,000 tpa (tons per annum) of caprolactam but was reaching a rate of only 47,000 tpa in early 1974. Government controls on the price of caprolactam put further financial pressure on the plant.〔 It was a failure of this plant that led to the disaster. A major leak of liquid from the reactor circuit caused the rapid formation of a large cloud of flammable hydrocarbon. When this met an ignition source (probably a furnace at a nearby hydrogen production plant) there was a massive fuel-air explosion. The plant control room collapsed, killing all 18 occupants. Nine other site workers were killed, and a delivery driver died of a heart attack in his cab. Fires were started on-site which were still burning 10 days later. Around 1,000 buildings within a mile radius of the site (in Flixborough itself, and in the neighbouring villages of Burton upon Stather and Amcotts) were damaged, as were nearly 800 in Scunthorpe (three miles away); the blast was heard over thirty miles away in Grimsby and Hull. Images of the disaster were soon shown on television due to BBC and Yorkshire Television filmstock news crews who had been covering the Appleby-Frodingham Gala in Scunthorpe that afternoon. The plant was re-built but cyclohexanone was now produced by hydrogenation of phenol (Nypro proposed to produce the hydrogen from LPG; in the absence of timely advice from the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) planning permission for storage of 1200 te LPG at Flixborough was initially granted subject to HSE approval, but HSE objected ); as a result of a subsequent collapse in the price of nylon it closed down a few years later. The site was demolished in 1981, although the administration block still remains. The site today is home to the Flixborough Industrial Estate, occupied by various businesses and Glanford Power Station. The foundations of properties severely damaged by the blast and subsequently demolished can be found on land between the estate and the village, on the route known as Stather Road. A memorial to those who died was erected in front of offices at the rebuilt site in 1977. Cast in bronze, it showed mallards alighting on water: When the plant was closed the statue was moved to the pond at the parish church in Flixborough. During the early hours of New Year's Day 1984 the sculpture was stolen. It has never been recovered but the plinth it stood on, with a plaque listing all those who died that day, can still be found outside the church. The cyclohexane oxidation process is still operated in much the same plant design in the Far East.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Flixborough disaster」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|