Employees working in industrial or construction settings are especially susceptible to serious workplace injuries. These environments often have extremely large and complicated machines that can cause catastrophic injuries when they malfunction or when proper safety procedures or maintenance procedures are not followed.
One such workplace accident appears to have occurred earlier this week when a factory worker was injured by an explosion at a tire plant. The blast occurred around 6:15 in the morning at the Titan Tire Corp. on Union Street, in Bryan, Ohio. The name of the injured worker has not yet been released. Thus far, all that is known is that the individual suffered serious injuries and was transported via air ambulance to Mercy St. Vincent Medical Center.
According to reports, the Bryan Fire Department responded to the scene of the explosion to assist the air ambulance, but never entered the factory. Presumably, the explosion did not result in any sort of fire or other injuries at the plant.
It is unclear what caused the explosion at the tire factory, but it is possible that this incident may be similar to an explosion that occurred at the plant in November of 2008. In that incident, at steam explosion injured one worker with a blast that was powerful enough to hurl a 5,000-pound piece of equipment through the plant’s ceiling.
A subsequent investigation of that blast led the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to fine the factory a total of $164,500 for various engineering and safety failures, including faulty welds that were not adequately tested and were insufficient to handle the pressure created by the large industrial machines used to manufacture tires at the plant.
OSHA has thus far not commented on the most recent explosion at the plant.
Related Resources:
Worker hurt seriously in tire plant blast: Bryan factory fined for safety issues in 2009 (The Toledo Blade)