Accidents will happen - Fires at chemical stores raise concerns

In recent months explosions have occurred at two different pesticide stores around the world. Faramalala Raveloharifera reports on the background to the events in Madagascar, and David Buffin reflects on the wider implications of such accidents.

Fires in Antananarivo on 5 November

Fire at Hoechst storage depot in Madagascar
On Wednesday 5 November three violent explosions occurred at a chemical warehouse owned by the multinational firm Hoechst in Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar. The explosions were followed by a fire that formed a huge dark grey cloud of  approximately 100 metres in diameter. At its height, the flames were 30 metres high and reached a temperature of 2,000oC. The fire was eventually extinguished after an hour and a half.
    Two firemen were injured whilst fighting the blaze, and two people were treated for breathing problems. The cause of the fire is not yet known.  The wind disbursed a cloud of pollution over a 1 to 2 km area that included a residential district and irrigated rice fields.
    In all, 155 tonnes of  chemicals involving 41 products were burnt off, including 10 tonnes of pesticides. Precisely what was in the store is not clear. So far Hoechst have produced three lists, all of which are different. Pesticides involved seem to be Coppersone (containing copper sulfate), Salut (containing chlorpyriphos and dimethoate), Thiodan (containing the organochlorine insecticide endosulfan), the herbicide 2,4-D, the insecticide Decis (containing deltamethrin), sulphur powder and zinc manganese.
    The storage depot is located in a heavily populated area, and hundreds of on-lookers gathered around the site despite the very pungent and irritating smoke. A mosque that can hold 3,000 people is just 15 metres from the site.
    The firemen used more than 50,000 litres of water which they had to transport to the site as the warehouse did not have sufficient water points. In addition, the depot had no special drainage to stop run-off water from contaminating nearby soil. The local authorities are concerned that lakes and other water points have been polluted by the chemical debris transported by the wind. People in the surrounding areas have been recommended by radio not to use the water, wash their clothes or consume any dead fish they may find. The Ministry of Industry sought more details from Hoechst about the impact of the chemicals at an emergency meeting it organised the day after the fire.
    An expert hired by Hoechst from South Africa, Piet Marais, has visited the site, taken samples and declared "there is no danger to the health of Hoechst personnel, or the population nearby." His task is to determine the cause of the incident, evaluate the resources necessary to remedy the situation, and to assess the health and environmental impact of the fire. The samples have been sent to South Africa for analysis.
    Twenty days after the blaze Hoechst had not yet issued the complete list of the products involved, despite official demands coming from the Ministries for Environment, Health and Industrialisation.
    The three ministries have put up a common team of experts who have prepared the terms of reference for an exhaustive environmental study, which they hope Hoechst will fund. A first set of soil and water samples have been collected by this same team and sent to Switzerland for analysis.
    There are two major outstanding concerns. Firstly, medical follow-up is needed for the group of about 200 people that were most exposed to the fumes during the blaze. Secondly, what will happen to the tonnes of toxic waste at the depot, in the surrounding soil and water-especially as the rainy season is about to start. 

Faramalala Raveloharifera, National Committee for the Control of the Management of Chemicals, Boite Postale 1939, Antananarivo, Madagascar.

Explosion in Birmingham, Alabama, on 9 October

Chlorpyrifos explosion in US Alabama warehouse

At 4pm on 9 October 1997 an unlicensed 'industrial distribution services warehouse' in Birmingham, Alabama, started burning. The cause was unknown.
    Inside the store were an estimated 18,000  gallons of Dursban TC, a termite killer containing 44% pure chlorpyrifos (an organophosphate [OP] insecticide). 25 tonnes of pressurised cans containing 1% of the OP Orthene (acephate) also went up in the fire, helping it reach 2,700^oC.
    These chemicals exploded in a series of fireballs, and firefighters fought the blaze for 30 hours until it finally burned out.
    The fire created a massive plume of dense smoke that drifted slowly over the entire town-centre. The firefighting operations led to millions of litres of chlor-pyriphos contaminated water, which flowed into Village Creek and then the Warrior River, causing a massive fish kill for 10 miles.
    The incident has led to one of the largest accidental releases of Dursban during its 30 years of use. "This is a fairly significant spill," said Tim Maniscalo, a spokesman for the manufacturers, DowElanao, according to the Birmingham News.
    There is a suspicion that the authorities are playing the incident down, according to Albert Donnay of the Multiple Chemical Sensitivity Referral and Resources in Baltimore. He complained: "Blood samples have been taken of those contaminated, but the results were unclear. So people were asked to re-submit, long after the incident." Albert Donnay was also concerned that no urine tests were carried out for TCP, a metabolite of chlorpyrifos.

Dave Parks, Birmingham News, 18 October, 1997.  

Pesticides Trust [now PAN UK] comment
Both these accidents happened close to the 13th anniversary of the Bhopal chemical plant disaster in India in 1984. Unlike in Bhopal, it is a miracle that nobody was killed. But they serve as timely reminders as to what can go wrong.
    The European Union's Seveso Directive is aimed at large-scale disaster planning in industrial processes to help prevent accidents similar to those described here.
    The Pesticides Trust [now PAN UK], with a number of other groups, helped draft the Charter on Industrial Hazards and Human Rights of the Permanent Peoples' Tribunal. It attempts to prevent disasters such as Bhopal happening again by examining the experience of those who have to live with the consequences of industrial hazards.
    In Madagascar and Alabama, the authorities still are not clear why the accidents occurred, and what the long-term consequences will be. Many questions about the safety of those living in the immediate vicinity of major chemical facilities remain unanswered.

[This article first appeared in Pesticides News No. 38, December 1997, page 3]