West Pharmaceuticals Explosion in North Carolina

Fox News | 01.29.03 | Me

[kcvl]

Plant employees over 200 people...

[not-alone]

My prayers for you and your community.

[kcvl]

Jack Lambert, who works at Segrave Aviation nearby, ran toward the plant to help people get out and saw about a dozen people with burns on their arms and backs. ``It smells like a bunch of rubber,'' Lambert told CNN.

The Lenoir County Sheriff's Department notified the medical examiner eight people had died, said Jane Martin at Pitt Memorial Hospital. The exact number of those injured because victims were being transferred between area hospitals.

[GovernmentShrinker]

You'd be amazed what people will put up with. About 12 years ago I was temping at a small office in Pennsylvania and saw a "hazardous substances" warning/certificate framed on the wall. Asked the lady who was supervising me what it was for. White-out -- seriously. The posting was required by law, due to the smelly compound that was used in white-out back then. This tiny office, which couldn't have had more than 2 bottles of the stuff on hand, had to post the warning.

[kcvl]

City manager Ralph Clark said some workers were believed to still be inside the West Pharmaceutical plant hours after the blast.

"We're trying to get them out," he said.

He had few details, but police said at least 100 workers has failed to contact their families by 3.30pm local time - two hours after the explosion

[DannyTN]

"Danny, please--no links to a magazine owned by Holocaust denier Willis Carto. "

Ooops, sorry, that certainly does squash the credibility. Which link was that?

I just did a quick google search on biologist deaths and linked to the first couple I had found, because I had read of the suspicious deaths several months ago. But I don't remember where I initially read it.

Regardless of that magazines credentials, some of the deaths such as the biologist that went missing in Memphis last year and was later found dead and which was widely reported are still pretty suspicious given the current environment.

Nevertheless I apologize for linking to any magazine owned by a Holocaust denier.

[snopercod]

When I saw the story breaking on fox there was an airport in the background.

I saw that too.

But you and the other "masses" should have listened in high school when they taught you about mass and kinetic energy. (Sorry to be snotty, but rampant ignorance of general aviation is one of my hot buttons.)

GA aircraft weigh very little (that's how come they can become airborne, Duh...) The one I own weighs less 690 lbs. empty.

They are made of lightweight aluminum or fiberglass. Even the engine is made of aluminum, except for the crankshaft, camshaft and lifters.

When they impact a building, they just splat like a bug on a windshield for the most part. But that doesn't stop the media from screaming "WE NEED TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT THOSE LITTLE PLANES!"

Educate youself, my friend. Or better yet - if you want to truely experience a freedom you have never known - learn to fly.

That's what the media want to kill - the freedom. Just like they want to grab all guns - same motive. Think about it.

[GovernmentShrinker]

'Several dead' in US factory blast
BBC ^ | Jan. 29 2003 | unknown


Posted on 01/29/2003 2:43 PM PST by Spangler


At least eight people are reported to have died in an explosion at a chemical plant in Kinston, North Carolina.

The blast at West Pharmaceuticals, which makes syringes and other plastic medical supplies, occurred shortly before 1900 GMT on Wednesday.

A spokeswoman at Pitt County Hospital, where five patients have been admitted with burn injuries, told BBC News Online she had been informed that eight people had died in the blast.

Eleven patients have been taken to the Lenoir Memorial Hospital, five of whom are in a critical condition, according to the TV network, Fox News.

At least 200 workers are thought to have turned up for work on Wednesday.

More than 10 people are trapped and 20 people unaccounted for, says the local newspaper The Free Press.

'Building destroyed'

Emergency workers are still struggling to put out the blaze.

"That whole building is gone. There's no saving any part of that building," a neighbour told Fox News.

There are reports of people fleeing with burns to their hands and backs.

Firefighters have still not been able to reach the worst hit area of the plant where many of company's employees were located at the time of the explosion.

Dozens of emergency crews are on the scene, including about seven emergency helicopters to airlift people out.

Smoke from the factory can be seen from up to 30 miles away.

Schools and businesses nearby have been evacuated.

Families of West Pharmaceutical workers have been told to wait for information in a nearby church.

The cause of the blast is being investigated.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/832029/posts

[Hoplite]

Pseudologica fantastica
This is fluent and plausible lying associated with hysterical or asocial personality disorders.

I believe it is Greg's affliction.

I'm not a psychiatrist, but I play one on FR... = )

[PleaseNoMore]

carolinamom, my daughter is doing very well. Thanks for asking. We were so blessed in her situation. She is literally a "miracle" child! From the beginning to the end of the whole ordeal she defied medical reasoning!

[L`enn]

As the good Doctor stated, a gaylord is the plastic industry's terminology for the tri-wall corrugated box the resin is stored/shipped in.

[petuniasevan]

A large (ours are about 4 1/2 feet on a side) heavy-duty cardboard box; at my plant we use them to store paper scrap.

[johnb838]

Sorry, my bad I skipped the first 350 messages. I ought to know better than that.

[johnb838]

Wait a minute. Apology retracted. The Dr. defined gaylord AFTER my post.

[wimpycat]

I just saw Cherie Berry (R) Commissioner of the NC Dept. of Labor on WRAL and she said that the violations were classified as "serious", but a "serious" violation has varying degrees of severity, and the fines had to do with their Lockout/Tagout program and Confined Space Entry program and other stuff like missing guardrails on steps and the like. She said the OSHA audit was a planned inspections (which means it wasn't in response to any complaints) and that all the violations were abated (meaning all the problems were taken care of) and that the Dept. of Labor was satisfied with how the plant addressed the problems.

Being somewhat familiar with OSHA inspections, I can tell you that when I heard about lockout/tagout and confined space entry violations, the first thing I thought of was that their training paperwork was out of order. Lockout/tagout training either wasn't done or else the paperwork proving the training wasn't completed. As far as OSHA is concerned, if you didn't write it down, it didn't happen. Also, whenever you enter a confined space, you have to complete a Confined Space Entry permit, which is a checklist showing that all the proper people were notified and everything was done according to OSHA regulations.

It's really not hard to incur $10,000 in fines during an inspection, and the violations, even though they are "serious" don't necessarily mean they were doing anything dangerous, like locking or blocking the exit doors.

[knak]

West also makes this:

Clip'n'Ject™ is a trademark of West Pharmaceutical Services, Inc. The Clip'n'Ject™ system from West Pharmaceutical Services offers the promise of safer, easier and more convenient drug reconstitution. The system consists of a plastic connector that links a syringe prefilled with a diluent to a standard vial.

Clip'n'Ject™ is convenient. The single-package system includes a prefilled syringe, the drug vial and an alcohol swab. The packaging is designed to maintain sterility.

[DannyTN]

"West also makes this:"

That looks like a "nice to have", to me. I don't think it would be much of a setback to any vaccination program to not have that.

[Bobby777]

WRAL link apparenly no longer works

it did when I used it an hour ago ... looks like it was overloaded ... interesting because I got a visit from WRAL-TV on my website today ... I saw it and wondered what it was ... I looked it up ... surprised me that it was the TV station from that area ... I've not seen them before today, or at least didn't notice them ...

[NerdDad]

OK. I read all the posts and didn't see anything about this so here goes. We have a company here that manufactures and packages surgical garments and the like. That plant uses a sterilization method that includes a radiological agent for irradiating the finished product when it reaches the warehouse. There are considerable safeguards including a 12' thick concrete pit where this agent resides.

Does anyone know if the West plant has anything similar? If so, what is the condition of that facility? It is not outside my realm of thinking that a 1 mile radius evacuation could be blamed on the smoke and omit certain contents of that smoke to avoid a mass panic.

[Catspaw]

I'll freepmail you about the link. I don't want to mention it more than once.

[Flyer]

. Detail of some of the OSHA violatons

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