The death toll in the Monday’s devastating explosion in the steel melting shop of the Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Limited, also known as Visakhapatnam Steel Plant, rose to nine, following the death of another worker on Wednesday, even as the three-member expert committee appointed by the Union ministry of steel began investigating the cause of the accident, officials said.
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Visakhapatnam district joint collector G Vidyadhari told reporters that a contract worker K Pydi Raju succumbed to severe burn injuries at Seven Hills Hospitals at 8.17 am. “He was one of the two workers among the six injured who suffered 90 percent burns,” she said.
The body was shifted to King George Hospital in the port city for post mortem and was later handed over to his family members, the joint collector added.
Meanwhile, the three-member expert committee headed by Bokaro Steel Plant director-in-charge Priya Ranjan and comprising Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) chief general manager Jitendra Kumar and retired SAIL chief general manager Gopal Singh visited the accident site for the second consecutive day on Wednesday.
A senior official familiar with the matter said preliminary investigation by the experts’ panel revealed that the explosion in the ladle might have been triggered by the sudden release of entrapped gases within molten steel.
“At the time of the accident, a crane was rotating a ladle filled with molten steel as part of the billet production process. Experts suspect that moments before the slide gate at the bottom of the ladle was opened to release the molten steel, gases trapped inside came under extreme pressure, causing a powerful explosion,” the official said.
In the steel-making process, raw iron is melted at temperatures ranging from 1,540 to 1,630 degrees Celsius. To convert molten iron into steel, oxygen is injected at high pressure. The oxygen reacts with impurities such as carbon, manganese and silicon, converting them into slag and gases. Some of these gases remain trapped within the molten metal, they might have got released suddenly, he said.
According to preliminary assessment made by the RINL authorities, the accident in the Steel Melt Shop-1 (SMS-1) may have caused losses exceeding ₹120 crore, including damage to machinery and equipment alone, besides halt in production of steel.
“The workers are so panicky that they are refusing to join the duty even after two days due to safety concerns. The RINL top officials tried to convince the employees to join the duty, but they remained outside the unit,” the officials said.
The Continuous Casting Department (CCD) of SMS-1 has six machines, of which five are normally operational. During the afternoon “B” shift on Monday, Machines 2, 3 and 4 were in operation. The explosion occurred near Machine-2 at around 4:30 p.m., severely damaging cables and other equipment across the section.
The shutdown of the CCD has also begun affecting operations in other sections of the steel plant, disrupting the overall production process.
Senior employee and INTUC leader D Adinarayana said the employees had been warning the RINL management regularly about the lack of safety measures in the steel plant and the probability of accidents.
“In December, too, the trade unions wrote a letter to the district authorities and state labour authorities, bringing to their notice the grave safety lapses, environmental hazards, and public health risks prevailing at the plant,” he said.
In the letter, the unions warned that if not addressed immediately, the situation could trigger a large-scale industrial catastrophe in the steel plant. The unions pointed out to non-implementation of safety guidelines, regular violation of standard operating procedures, maintenance procedures and hazard identification and risk assessment protocols.
“We also highlighted mass reduction of manpower through VRS, with no replacement recruitment, illegal retrenchment of contract workers, reducing essential maintenance strength, arbitrary transfers of highly experienced employees without consultation or training and severe mental stress and fatigue due to overwork,” Adinarayana said.
On Wednesday, YSR Congress party president and former chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy visited the accident site at the plant and also called on the injured. He demanded an ex-gratia of ₹1 crore over and above what is due, along with a job for the kin of the deceased in the steel plant mishap.
Jagan also demanded that the state assembly pass a resolution opposing the privatization of Visakhapatnam Steel Plant. “The government is boasting about the ₹11,440 crore package for the steel plant, but the amount is not meant to improve safety parameters or employee welfare. Instead, it is meant for reducing staff through VRS, clearing bank dues, and other such measures,” he criticised.
