Crane Falls Into Electric Arc Furnace at Turkish Steel Plant: Explosion Kills 17 Workers
An explosion and fire tore through the HABAŞ steel plant in Aliağa, İzmir Province, in western Turkey at about 11:46 a.m. local time on November 9. During casting, an overhead crane carrying a replacement boiler collapsed into an electric arc furnace, damaging a natural gas line and setting off a blast. Health Minister Kemal Memişoğlu confirmed in the evening that one of the critically injured workers had died, raising the death toll to 17, with at least 12 others injured.
The toll climbed through the day. The İzmir governor's office first reported 6 dead, 14 injured and 10 trapped, with rescue work continuing into the evening. After a cabinet meeting, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan put the toll at 16 dead and 13 injured, two of them critical; the health minister then announced that one of the critical patients had died. Injury counts varied between officials, ranging from 12 to 15.
A worker told Agence France-Presse that the crane's rope snapped and about 120 tonnes of molten steel fell into the furnace, where contact with water-cooled panels set off a hydrogen explosion; official accounts confirmed only that a crane fell into the furnace. HABAŞ said the accident occurred during scheduled maintenance on one of its arc furnaces. Relatives gathered outside the plant and at Aliağa State Hospital in protest; AFP reported that the brother of one of the dead workers set himself alight outside the factory and was taken to hospital by bystanders.
The Menemen Chief Public Prosecutor's Office, which covers Aliağa, assigned four prosecutors and an expert panel to the judicial investigation, and the Ministry of Labour and Social Security appointed a chief inspector to examine workplace safety. Five people were detained in connection with the blast, six by that evening. The interior, labour and health ministers all travelled to the site.
The HABAŞ works, which began operating in 1987 and produces about 4.5 million tonnes of steel a year, is one of Turkey's largest steelmakers. The plant has a long record of fatal accidents: the labour-safety watchdog İSİG counts at least 11 worker deaths there over the past decade, a 120-tonne ladle spill injured 11 workers in 2019, and two workers died in separate incidents at the plant in the three weeks before this explosion.
(Source: Associated Press)
Source: Associated Press
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Photo: 图：钢铁厂高炉资料图（英国 Scunthorpe 钢铁厂）。照片：Gareth James 摄，CC BY-SA 2.0，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / Photo: Blast furnaces at a steelworks (file photo: Scunthorpe Steelworks, UK). Photo by Gareth James, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
