5:23 wow! Look at the detail and accuracy on that white railroad tank car! I'm a model railroader and I'm telling you they've captured everything, the air hoses, the grab iron ladder rungs, the curvature of the coupler lift bar, the air brake reservoir cylinder. I can't believe they can achieve this level of detail for a brief background object!
These animations are used in the investigation so they HAVE to get every last detail, in another video they said that they even have to get even the smallest details like how a chain on a valve was hanging, or what direction a padlock was facing.
This incident was quite complex, but the operators did better that 95% of the other CSB videos: they identified the problem, and accumulating issues, and tried to resolve them. It only took a few mistakes for this accident to happen.
... no, they did not do well at all. MeSH has boiling point of 5gradC... therefore it was certain, that a significant part of the MeSH will evaporate during the "defrosting" procedure - and the operators knew, that the only place for it to escape was the vent system - which obviously (from how the rest of the story unfolds) vents to atmosphere - not to a scrubber or a flare! Moreover, everybody involved was incredibly lucky, that this all happened in winter. If it had happened during the summer, when the temperature of the process water was much higher, the water, that entered the piping in the first place would not form the hydrate, but flow into the storage tank, where it would have evaporated significant part of the MeSH inventory. This would have had likely ruptured the storage tank, or the piping, leading to massive release of MeSH - due to its toxicity, this would have been an US version of bhopal...
It all began with incomplete isolation of the reactor. The next and deadly mistake was leaving a supply pump on even though they didn't want anything supplied (tell me how that could happen - i mean that's like leaving a foot on the accelerator while in park)
And again it was human error that caused the accident. The two brothers died needlessly because they ignored basic safety principles of not rushing into an unknown situation with out assessing the risk much like an attendant entering a confined space to rescue the worker inside instead of calling for help from trained responders.
@@chloralhydrate does that system vent to the atmosphere? if the feed line was connected to the vent system at all, the vent system must be designed to deal with the chemical in that feed line. the gas was released when they tried to drain liquid from the vent system, which the video says is standard procedure, but it's also implied that liquid shouldn't be in the vent system at all. if the issue of liquid in the vent system was dealt with before the situation with the blockages, they would have noticed "hey there's liquid in our vent system, where did that come from?" rather than just going to drain it
Methylmercaptan is the stinky chemical found in lots of stuff, from skunk secretions to rotting organic matter. It's typically mixed with natural gas as an odourant for easy detection of leaks giving that characteristic "pungeant gas" smell Makes it all the more tragic that 4 people died suffocating on it though, what a terrible way to go
As someone who was nocturnal for thirty years, I beg to differ, but I understand what you mean. Companies forcing diurnal people to work at night is always a disaster waiting to happen.
I had a friend working there as a technical staff member. After the accident they began work on corrective actions but DuPont decided to shut it down. They came into work one day and were laid off with basically no warning, but hey, economics always rule. A few things not really mentioned in this video was fatigue and pressure from leaders to get the unit up and making pounds. It is very easy to lose situational awareness when many things are not going as planned. Add in fatigue, which is a major factor affecting shift workers. One question that should have been raised is what was the composition of the fluids that were routinely drained from the vent header prior to this tragedy. Did it have a history of having methyl mercaptan in it? If not, the operators could have become conditioned to not expecting that concentration of the chemical.
yep agree, seen it to often, targets, bonuses, promotion, and goodie too shoes bum lickers. Its all rush rush rush, pay less less less. Cut corners these days is like using this shavings as resources are none. Chemical factories that do not have remote controlled shut of valves these days and sealled hazmat areas/room for escape and panic buttons, no wonder these branded companies make so much money ! Shift changes, no one goes home until the emergency is cleared and the safety team say so. Communication and resources will get lost if not, Commumication is the major factor in accidents. 2nd is resources. 3rd is the company saving money on safety aspects, (cutting corners) 4th human error 5th computer programed wrong by a human,
Re: things not really mentioned in this video was fatigue and pressure from leaders to get the unit up Yeah, and that's the part of this "investigation" that doesn't get mentioned in any of these otherwise excellent videos. If fatigue and overwork were factors, then the executives with the huge stock options should go to jail.
working through a shift change instead of leaving it the next day for the same team to finish the job seems to be a re-occurring human factor in these accidents. These companies never want to wait a day.
This one made me grateful that I'm a programmer - I essentially make mistakes like this all the time due to the complexity of the systems I work on, yet there is often very little real-world consequence other than maybe a disgruntled user. I have empathy for the engineers and technicians who worked on this, esp in regards to their mistake in keeping that valve open. It seems in this case there wasn't really a disregard to safety so much as an engineering mistake.
Safety was disregarded multiple times, I cringed super hard at least 5 different times. The biggest one was the poorly designed vent system which they didn’t fix they just lived with and ignored alarms in. The other big cringe was closing the valve to the reactor and then walking off when they almost had the blockage cleared
software engineer - if you run some production online service then you know how having a system downtime is like being in active warzone repairing a broken down tank under artillery shelling. not to mention having a critical security hole found in your supply chain somewhere
isn't that the issue almost always either a closed valve leads to a weaker component breaking open, a closed valve leads to contents redirecting to unintended locations, or valves are left open in error
I'm a retired industrial union painter, and I never did like working inside chemical companies. I worked in several plant's in Louisville KY area called Rubbertown. It's amazing a very bad accident never happened there. Rusty old pipes, and storage tanks. All of them also had loading and unloading facilities on the Ohio River.
This is why you don't understaff your Environmental health & safety department. These greedy corporations don't want to spend the money to take the load off the shift supervisors' backs and let the EHS safety officers protect your staff and facility from accidents like this.
Have you been to a refinery? Perhaps if they maybe worked a weekend or possibly stayed onsite for more than 7 hours. Environmental is a job for small minded little hitlers.
I wanna be the guy who goes into the toxic clouds past dead people and turns off the thingy. I bet that guy gets paid and I'm already emotionally fucked up from home invasion gone wrong type shit so I can walk past some dead people in an HEV suit and turn things off if I get dental coverage. Like 90% of it is just driving quick to wherever at some unlikely time. It just sounds like okay work.
At first when I saw this new form of video it was a bit more of a departure from their normal presentation, I didn't really care for it, but now I really dig it. I love these videos, it's like a little mystery video, not to mention the information and animation are very detailed and clear to understand.
States of flux are almost always the most dangerous ones in any process unit. Coming up, or going down are fraught with potential problems you just dont deal with daily. Its really a shame this is the way lessons are often learned.
I really enjoy learning about safety in industrial facilities from CSB. The animations are amazing. It's awful the tragedies that have occurred, but I am thankful that we have organizations like the CSB to investigate what went wrong so others, like myself, can learn what to watch out for in our own facilities.
I love these videos because they have the natural consequence of raising workplace safety awareness. Remember folks, you always have the right to refuse unsafe work.
From what I have read methomyl is produced by producing first an intermediate oxime, usually methylthiomethyl oxime, and then reacting it with methyl isocyanate. I believe the production of the intermediate using methyl mercaptan is unique to DuPont.
The narrator needs to be hired for Forensic Files III.... his voice is so soothing! And the animators..... wow, yall are getting reeeeeally good at this!
Methylmercaptane is also used for giving natural gas the gas odor most everyone is familiar with. I got a whiff of the stuff by just standing next to a tank of it in a plant, and could almost taste it at the thought for several weeks later.
That’s the characteristic that butyl mercaptan has they want considering it’s detectable in parts per trillion by humans. Incidentally it also forms in bottled beer when its packed in green or clear bottles uv light breaks down amino acids in the hops they use to flavor beer creating an off flavor commonly know as skunking. It’s also the active ingredient in skunk spray as well.
My goodness. That was a complicated set of failures. I appreciate the CSB for making a 3D model that seemed quite accurate of the processing units and the animations they made to show the flow of Methyl Mercaptan and Hot Water. This is good to keep in mind, I think a lesson could be learned to evaluate where the flow will relieve too if the liquid expands and flows from the pipe into the vent header. And another lesson would be to have proper drain points or knock out pots, so liquid does not build up in the vent header.
Shift change? Oh, hell no. I wouldn’t be able to leave my job if there was a critical chemical PROBLEM that complex. No pay? Fine. I’m not risking my coworkers or the public.
The problem was complex in hindsight, but their misunderstanding made it seem very simple. You would have briefed the new supervisor and gone home to your family. You would have no reason to believe anyone was at risk. Hindsight is 20/20.
PPE is the last line of defense. Before that are hazard elimination, hazard substitution, engineering controls, and administrative controls. Workers should never have been required to vent pipes connected to process lines into the building, especially with acutely toxic chemicals in use.
Oh Captain, Mercaptan! Ross would be proud - this is the stuff that makes natural gas smell bad. Tell someone that on a date and they'll think you're a huge nerd.
How is it not standard practice for employees to carry respirator or emergency SCBA equipment ON THEIR PERSON when working with highly toxic materials? It is just common sense, especially in confined spaces and with such huge quantities or material.
It was never thought possible for it to be in that building. Literally tons of it got injected into the vent system, turning the whole place into a gas chamber. Emergency SCBA was available. The two brothers looked like they had donned five-minute escape hoods, but died anyway.
Not opening valve--> no water in feedline--> no hydrate-->no need of heating--> no thermal expansion---> No overpressure of feedline--> no need of venting---> no methylmercaptane in vent system---> no release of methylmercaptane
These animations are so good. Especially for being a bit of an older video, makes me more intrigued. Thanks TH-cam, I’ll never use this information but it’s interesting as fuck.
I have learned so much about the the processes needed to make stuff from this channel......I love learning how stuff is made..then I also like to know what happens when you FUBAR a process that can kill people My top 2 Subscriptions on You-Tube are "How it's made" and "USCSB"
The transportation department of the DuPont LaPorte TX Lannate Unit used one of my company's empty 45 ft dry van trailers to ship pallets of packaged Lannate 90WD to a local warehouse, prior to ocean going export. We had delivered packaging-related materials to the Unit and dropped the trailer. After the offloading of our materials, either DuPont or their transportation contractor decided to use our empty trailer for a few deliveries to their offsite packaged goods storage warehouse. During offloading of Lannate 90WD packaged and palletized materials at the offsite warehouse, some of the packaging sustained damaged and spilled Lannate 90WD throughout our trailer. DuPont or its transportation contractor then unknowingly returned the contaminated trailer to our plant location. Upon its return, a warehouse/truck loading worker at our site saw the material in the trailer. Not indentifying the existence of a hazardous condition, he was about to enter the trailer and sweep it clean with a push broom. I just happened to have left my front office for a walk around the production plant and was walking by the dock door and stopped the employee from entering the open trailer when I saw piles of white powder throughout the trailer. The trailer was quarantined and guarded. I called the DuPont plant and they immediately dispatched a person to investigate my concern. As I suspected, the spilled material in the trailer was Lannate 90WD powder. DuPont retrieved the trailer from our location, had their personnel decontaminate it, and returned the trailer to us the following week. The investigator told me that had our employee entered the confined space of the trailer and began sweeping the powder, the resulting cloud would have overcome the employee, likely causing severe injury or death, and our production plant would have been highly contaminated, thus shutting down operations. I'll never forget how a tragic situation almost occurred that day and only by the grace of God was I walking by and saw the potential hazard. I still wonder about the forklift driver who was handling the damaged and leaking packages at the offsite storage location.
I don't know anything about this kind of work so I find these animations informational so I do have one question. Why was the system designed with the option to vent into a building where people worked, when a hazardous material is able to accidentally make its way into said system? It seems like a deadly problem waiting to happen. Hopefully that actually made sense to someone reading and not just me.
I'm a little surprised a plant working with poisonous and volatile compounds wouldn't have either 1) SCBA gear stored in multiple easy-to-reach locations, for workers to be able to close valves or shut down equipment in the event of an accidental release, or 2) equip teams with smaller breathing masks, with a short-term air supply, intended for immediate evacuation while a better-equipped damage control team is en route.
@@jonathaneweaver1 Investigators learnt that Jonathaneweaver1 did not count the number of methl mercaptan's in the video correctly. It was at this point that the intoxication level exceeded safety limits, resulting in a catastrophic intoxication. We're already working on it. - USCSB
If it's a mercaptan the smell from working around this factory would be horrible. I'm surprised they could find anyone to work there. Good presentation. And DuPont is known for having a serious process safety management program.
I had just finished a Turnaround there on night shift when this happened.... I remember hearing about this the morning of, very tragic situation.... The two brothers that died was simply just human emotion... One brother went down, died from the exposure, and the other brother was apart of the 4 other who went to help... He saw his brother down and chose to go in after him, I think any sane man would have done the same thing.
Several reasons- Usually for cleaning/purging of equipment. If just the feed tank needed to be cleared you wouldn't purge through the reactor, you would purge it to the vent header, but only if it were liquid free. These kind of connections are absolutely necessary for maintenance to be performed, but what happened here was during troubleshooting which is a much more difficult situation to deal with.
It still shocks me that people just walk away from a currently running, ad-hoc chemical process "hey let's go take a coffee break, this doesn't need eyes on it at all times". As always a very well done video, and a sad one.
I like these. They make me feel smart for knowing not to mix things and having a basic understanding o fchemistry (I'm not saying these professionals don't know that btw)
I was waiting for the voice to go all "but unbeknownst to the herd of wildebeasts, there is danger lurking underneath the deceptively calm surface of the pool. A vacuum inside this Nile crocodile's stomach has been steadily building up over the last twenty-four hours..."
![KRK - ชนิสรา Ft.WanMai , N/A [Official MV] Prod. By Sakarin](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/C-WMwwYobcU/mqdefault.jpg)
Whoever makes the animation for these videos does an outstanding job. And the narrator makes it very suspenseful.
And kept it short enough to use in a safety briefing or other presentation.
Yes, these animations make it very clear what happened; EXCELLENT animation!
Sounds like the narrator for Forensic Files lol
@@amandalong5916 Peter Thomas, I thought the same thing! But it's not him.
I find them quite fascinating.
Me having no idea what I'm talking about: "What idiot left that methyl mercaptan feed valve open?"
Evergreen XCVI Somebody not checking with a super
It certainly is a complicated series of piping and treatment.
Heat trace the pipe work
I dont get why they don't have any kind of sensors on the valves to check if they're open
@@krissp8712 the amount of valves are easily controlled.
Along with a few essential sensors and alarms the procedure should be way safer ...
I should be asleep but I'm on CSB binge.
This channel’s animations and explanations both inspire and raise awareness for all audiences.....I hope they keep doing what they’re doing
Me too. Fascinating and well-made videos. All plant managers and operators should view all these videos.
Yeah I agree they would learn so.much from watching these videos
What happened to the channel?
r0ckt3hc4sb4h I KNOW RIGHT,
5:23 wow! Look at the detail and accuracy on that white railroad tank car! I'm a model railroader and I'm telling you they've captured everything, the air hoses, the grab iron ladder rungs, the curvature of the coupler lift bar, the air brake reservoir cylinder. I can't believe they can achieve this level of detail for a brief background object!
It has to be some public domain model that's available out there, right? These things would cost stacks upon stacks to make otherwise.
@@krpajda Probably not public domain, but visualization animation companies likely buy many small 3D assets from licensed asset vendors.
Krpajda it’s the government believe me it cost stacks and stack to make theses animations back then
These animations are used in the investigation so they HAVE to get every last detail, in another video they said that they even have to get even the smallest details like how a chain on a valve was hanging, or what direction a padlock was facing.
Just kids showing off their graphic design skills. Lol
This incident was quite complex, but the operators did better that 95% of the other CSB videos: they identified the problem, and accumulating issues, and tried to resolve them. It only took a few mistakes for this accident to happen.
... no, they did not do well at all. MeSH has boiling point of 5gradC... therefore it was certain, that a significant part of the MeSH will evaporate during the "defrosting" procedure - and the operators knew, that the only place for it to escape was the vent system - which obviously (from how the rest of the story unfolds) vents to atmosphere - not to a scrubber or a flare!
Moreover, everybody involved was incredibly lucky, that this all happened in winter. If it had happened during the summer, when the temperature of the process water was much higher, the water, that entered the piping in the first place would not form the hydrate, but flow into the storage tank, where it would have evaporated significant part of the MeSH inventory. This would have had likely ruptured the storage tank, or the piping, leading to massive release of MeSH - due to its toxicity, this would have been an US version of bhopal...
It all began with incomplete isolation of the reactor. The next and deadly mistake was leaving a supply pump on even though they didn't want anything supplied (tell me how that could happen - i mean that's like leaving a foot on the accelerator while in park)
Can someone tell me why the vent was not connected to a chemical scrubber, catalytic oxidizer, or a flare tower
Edit: spelled flare wrong
And again it was human error that caused the accident. The two brothers died needlessly because they ignored basic safety principles of not rushing into an unknown situation with out assessing the risk much like an attendant entering a confined space to rescue the worker inside instead of calling for help from trained responders.
@@chloralhydrate does that system vent to the atmosphere? if the feed line was connected to the vent system at all, the vent system must be designed to deal with the chemical in that feed line. the gas was released when they tried to drain liquid from the vent system, which the video says is standard procedure, but it's also implied that liquid shouldn't be in the vent system at all. if the issue of liquid in the vent system was dealt with before the situation with the blockages, they would have noticed "hey there's liquid in our vent system, where did that come from?" rather than just going to drain it
Me, not knowing a thing about what is going on: Hmmm yes, this meth-on-my-captain sounds very dangerous
Methylmercaptan is the stinky chemical found in lots of stuff, from skunk secretions to rotting organic matter. It's typically mixed with natural gas as an odourant for easy detection of leaks giving that characteristic "pungeant gas" smell
Makes it all the more tragic that 4 people died suffocating on it though, what a terrible way to go
It’s truly tragic. Especially two of them being brothers. I can’t imagine what their families went through. 😞
Meth-on-my-captain is indeed dangerous. Same with My-captain-on-meth.
Once again the old wisdom is affirmed:
... nothing good happens after 3 a.m.
nothing good except sleep.....speaking of sleep tho, the time approaches 3AM as we speak.....
Night shift is always getting their ass kicked by something dumb that day shift came up with.
As someone who was nocturnal for thirty years, I beg to differ, but I understand what you mean. Companies forcing diurnal people to work at night is always a disaster waiting to happen.
I had a friend working there as a technical staff member. After the accident they began work on corrective actions but DuPont decided to shut it down. They came into work one day and were laid off with basically no warning, but hey, economics always rule.
A few things not really mentioned in this video was fatigue and pressure from leaders to get the unit up and making pounds. It is very easy to lose situational awareness when many things are not going as planned. Add in fatigue, which is a major factor affecting shift workers.
One question that should have been raised is what was the composition of the fluids that were routinely drained from the vent header prior to this tragedy. Did it have a history of having methyl mercaptan in it? If not, the operators could have become conditioned to not expecting that concentration of the chemical.
thx for adding that.
yep agree, seen it to often, targets, bonuses, promotion, and goodie too shoes bum lickers. Its all rush rush rush, pay less less less. Cut corners these days is like using this shavings as resources are none.
Chemical factories that do not have remote controlled shut of valves these days and sealled hazmat areas/room for escape and panic buttons, no wonder these branded companies make so much money !
Shift changes, no one goes home until the emergency is cleared and the safety team say so. Communication and resources will get lost if not,
Commumication is the major factor in accidents.
2nd is resources.
3rd is the company saving money on safety aspects, (cutting corners)
4th human error
5th computer programed wrong by a human,
Re: things not really mentioned in this video was fatigue and pressure from leaders to get the unit up
Yeah, and that's the part of this "investigation" that doesn't get mentioned in any of these otherwise excellent videos. If fatigue and overwork were factors, then the executives with the huge stock options should go to jail.
working through a shift change instead of leaving it the next day for the same team to finish the job seems to be a re-occurring human factor in these accidents. These companies never want to wait a day.
In the written CSB report, it was mentioned that the workers expected to drain process condensate from the waste gas vent header.
This one made me grateful that I'm a programmer - I essentially make mistakes like this all the time due to the complexity of the systems I work on, yet there is often very little real-world consequence other than maybe a disgruntled user.
I have empathy for the engineers and technicians who worked on this, esp in regards to their mistake in keeping that valve open. It seems in this case there wasn't really a disregard to safety so much as an engineering mistake.
Safety was disregarded multiple times, I cringed super hard at least 5 different times. The biggest one was the poorly designed vent system which they didn’t fix they just lived with and ignored alarms in. The other big cringe was closing the valve to the reactor and then walking off when they almost had the blockage cleared
I was a Senior operator at a very large facility and these mistakes can easily happen. Nice you appreciate how difficult this job can be.
Didn't Boeing 737 MAX planes fall out of the sky because of issues with the MCAS software?
ChatGPT will find you eventually
software engineer - if you run some production online service then you know how having a system downtime is like being in active warzone repairing a broken down tank under artillery shelling. not to mention having a critical security hole found in your supply chain somewhere
Thank you CSB for posting another excellent video.
3:07
You know you've watched too many of these when you know there's going to be an expansion issue because of the closed valve.
Yeabut it really was valves open to the vent header which was the cargo last place this shit was intended
isn't that the issue almost always
either a closed valve leads to a weaker component breaking open, a closed valve leads to contents redirecting to unintended locations, or valves are left open in error
yo sick profile pic
DuPont seems to be a common place to get killers while working.
I usually hire two or three of them if I really need a job done right.
Dupont has there hands in a ton of dangerous plants all over the u.s what do you expect shit happens at those plants
I know "killers" is a typo but DuPont eneded up killing a wrestler so your comment still works!
Yea I'm a union Boilermaker, I hated working in there chemical dumps, glad I made it out alive retire now thank god
@@josephastier7421 Hahaha!! Very good!
I find these animations fascinating, and easy to understand for a non scientist.
The music you guys used was surprisingly good. Whatever team the USCSB has making these is top-notch.
The sound design for this is oddly incredibly good
There should be a TV series about these accidents in a CSI style with actors and full episodes for each accident!.
NOT CSI STYLE! GOD NO!
@@slitor NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
I feel what your saying and I'd watch the show for sure. I'd let Dick Wolf be the producer.
The fact that humans can construct and maintain such a complex facility is unfathomable.
I'm a retired industrial union painter, and I never did like working inside chemical companies. I worked in several plant's in Louisville KY area called Rubbertown. It's amazing a very bad accident never happened there. Rusty old pipes, and storage tanks. All of them also had loading and unloading facilities on the Ohio River.
You should have blown the whistle to OSHA.
This is why you don't understaff your Environmental health & safety department. These greedy corporations don't want to spend the money to take the load off the shift supervisors' backs and let the EHS safety officers protect your staff and facility from accidents like this.
Have you been to a refinery? Perhaps if they maybe worked a weekend or possibly stayed onsite for more than 7 hours. Environmental is a job for small minded little hitlers.
@@nocomment3600 Still no justification to ignore safety procedures or do the basic things needed to not accidently get your employees injured/killed
*anyone else binge watching these CSB investigations?*
*makes me wanna apply as a safety or investigation officer*
Fucking same. Like.... I can't trust these people in my community any more... Jack asses are gonna leave a valve open or ignore a gauge
The world has enough white hats.
You're already a prince. Is that really necessary?
I wanna be the guy who goes into the toxic clouds past dead people and turns off the thingy. I bet that guy gets paid and I'm already emotionally fucked up from home invasion gone wrong type shit so I can walk past some dead people in an HEV suit and turn things off if I get dental coverage. Like 90% of it is just driving quick to wherever at some unlikely time. It just sounds like okay work.
Trust me, you don't want to be a safety inspector
Im on a CSB binge for sure. The excellence of these animations can not be understated
That voice coupled with the background score makes me gravitate towards this video more and more each time I watch it! Great job guys!!
At first when I saw this new form of video it was a bit more of a departure from their normal presentation, I didn't really care for it, but now I really dig it.
I love these videos, it's like a little mystery video, not to mention the information and animation are very detailed and clear to understand.
States of flux are almost always the most dangerous ones in any process unit. Coming up, or going down are fraught with potential problems you just dont deal with daily. Its really a shame this is the way lessons are often learned.
I've been watching quite a few of your videos and it seems du pont are a common topic
Duponts own n run many different plants and all kinds of different businesses
I really enjoy learning about safety in industrial facilities from CSB. The animations are amazing. It's awful the tragedies that have occurred, but I am thankful that we have organizations like the CSB to investigate what went wrong so others, like myself, can learn what to watch out for in our own facilities.
I love these videos because they have the natural consequence of raising workplace safety awareness. Remember folks, you always have the right to refuse unsafe work.
From what I have read methomyl is produced by producing first an intermediate oxime, usually methylthiomethyl oxime, and then reacting it with methyl isocyanate. I believe the production of the intermediate using methyl mercaptan is unique to DuPont.
the animation this time around was so visually pleasing. props to the animator- great job!
The narrator needs to be hired for Forensic Files III.... his voice is so soothing! And the animators..... wow, yall are getting reeeeeally good at this!
Methylmercaptane is also used for giving natural gas the gas odor most everyone is familiar with. I got a whiff of the stuff by just standing next to a tank of it in a plant, and could almost taste it at the thought for several weeks later.
This is incorrect.
+CheckAvability --> It's actually butyl mercaptan.
In Germany Tetrahydrothiophene is used to "odourise" natural gas. But you're right, the stench from CH3SH is terrible.
That’s the characteristic that butyl mercaptan has they want considering it’s detectable in parts per trillion by humans. Incidentally it also forms in bottled beer when its packed in green or clear bottles uv light breaks down amino acids in the hops they use to flavor beer creating an off flavor commonly know as skunking. It’s also the active ingredient in skunk spray as well.
6:39 I love that quick head turn. "Yeah its m- WHAT!?"
My goodness. That was a complicated set of failures. I appreciate the CSB for making a 3D model that seemed quite accurate of the processing units and the animations they made to show the flow of Methyl Mercaptan and Hot Water. This is good to keep in mind, I think a lesson could be learned to evaluate where the flow will relieve too if the liquid expands and flows from the pipe into the vent header. And another lesson would be to have proper drain points or knock out pots, so liquid does not build up in the vent header.
Shift change? Oh, hell no. I wouldn’t be able to leave my job if there was a critical chemical PROBLEM that complex. No pay? Fine. I’m not risking my coworkers or the public.
The problem was complex in hindsight, but their misunderstanding made it seem very simple. You would have briefed the new supervisor and gone home to your family. You would have no reason to believe anyone was at risk.
Hindsight is 20/20.
@@lambdaman3228 Exactly.
And I do believe you, sure I do.
i call bullshit
@@mantequillaop8262 oh yeah
Sounds like proper PPE by DuPonte could have saved the lives of the 4 workers that attempted to close the valves.
Full respirators and oxygen tanks aren’t PPE you typically walk around with
PPE is the last line of defense. Before that are hazard elimination, hazard substitution, engineering controls, and administrative controls.
Workers should never have been required to vent pipes connected to process lines into the building, especially with acutely toxic chemicals in use.
@@hexane360 Bingo, what kind of workplace vents anything into a closed space(building)?
The brothers were Robert and Gilbert Tisnado. What's sad is Gilbert was bringing a gas mask to his brother and they both died.
Why do all the valves make a noise just by being valves?
Music in the background is GREAT
Yarr matey! What be that foul stench?
Tis a bit of Methyl M'Captain!
You should be forced to walk the plank for that pun.
Oh Captain, Mercaptan!
Ross would be proud - this is the stuff that makes natural gas smell bad. Tell someone that on a date and they'll think you're a huge nerd.
Methyl M'Captain reporting for duty
These informatic videos are super instructive! Cannot thank enough.
How is it not standard practice for employees to carry respirator or emergency SCBA equipment ON THEIR PERSON when working with highly toxic materials? It is just common sense, especially in confined spaces and with such huge quantities or material.
$$$$$$$$$$
This stuff kills so quickly I’m not even sure it would have helped them. It’s real scary stuff.
It was never thought possible for it to be in that building. Literally tons of it got injected into the vent system, turning the whole place into a gas chamber. Emergency SCBA was available. The two brothers looked like they had donned five-minute escape hoods, but died anyway.
It is standard practice with certain chemicals. This being one. Operators unfortunately don't always suit up when they should.
There should be alarms on certain valves that can cause a dangerous situation if left opened or closed.
4thegloryofthelord yeah but after watch lots of theses videos they almost always ignore them.
@@tonywalker2334 Or just turn off the alarm cos its annoying LMAO
i so badly want this man to read me bedtime stories
he has the perfect grizzled old man voice and i love it so much
The music on this is awesome.
What’s the background music lol it’s good
I would like to know this as well
1:28 main error that led to the accident was leaving open the valve to the feedline
Not opening valve--> no water in feedline--> no hydrate-->no need of heating--> no thermal expansion---> No overpressure of feedline--> no need of venting---> no methylmercaptane in vent system---> no release of methylmercaptane
I have no idea why TH-cam suggested this channel to me, but it’s extremely interesting.
The animation and narration is outstanding in all these videos, damn
The situation could have been far worse if the initial water leak had occured in the summer and vaporized the contents of the tank
What is with the lack of remote control valves at DuPont? What is this the 1950's...?
RIGHT?!?!
I remember when this happened you could smell it like 30 miles away
What did it smell like?
@@jacobshirley3457 I assume horrible
My brother in law was a long time operator at that plant. Hope this finds you well Larry Sandafer. God bless.
These animations are so good. Especially for being a bit of an older video, makes me more intrigued. Thanks TH-cam, I’ll never use this information but it’s interesting as fuck.
When asked to give an assessment on the fatal methyl mercaptan release, authorities simply said, "it stinks."
I am an IT guy. Instead of watching some it tutorials I am watching these. These are so interesting.
Why can't there be simple mechanical flags attached to valves that use a colour shape that shows which state it is in?
These videos are great and the animators do a great job. The narrator adds that finishing touch.
This narrator needs to do documentary jobs, he’s got a beautiful voice
The old " it's not my job routine" Kills more people on job sites then any other
One thing I've learned: Never work as a contractor doing hot work at a chem plant. Just don't DEW IT
So happy to work as an operator! Trust no pipe!
I have learned so much about the the processes needed to make stuff from this channel......I love learning how stuff is made..then I also like to know what happens when you FUBAR a process that can kill people
My top 2 Subscriptions on You-Tube are "How it's made" and "USCSB"
JimboBillyBob Justice sand
I particularly enjoyed the video: How Plumbuses Are Made
@@rotaryskratch18 You got me
The transportation department of the DuPont LaPorte TX Lannate Unit used one of my company's empty 45 ft dry van trailers to ship pallets of packaged Lannate 90WD to a local warehouse, prior to ocean going export. We had delivered packaging-related materials to the Unit and dropped the trailer. After the offloading of our materials, either DuPont or their transportation contractor decided to use our empty trailer for a few deliveries to their offsite packaged goods storage warehouse. During offloading of Lannate 90WD packaged and palletized materials at the offsite warehouse, some of the packaging sustained damaged and spilled Lannate 90WD throughout our trailer. DuPont or its transportation contractor then unknowingly returned the contaminated trailer to our plant location. Upon its return, a warehouse/truck loading worker at our site saw the material in the trailer. Not indentifying the existence of a hazardous condition, he was about to enter the trailer and sweep it clean with a push broom. I just happened to have left my front office for a walk around the production plant and was walking by the dock door and stopped the employee from entering the open trailer when I saw piles of white powder throughout the trailer. The trailer was quarantined and guarded. I called the DuPont plant and they immediately dispatched a person to investigate my concern. As I suspected, the spilled material in the trailer was Lannate 90WD powder. DuPont retrieved the trailer from our location, had their personnel decontaminate it, and returned the trailer to us the following week. The investigator told me that had our employee entered the confined space of the trailer and began sweeping the powder, the resulting cloud would have overcome the employee, likely causing severe injury or death, and our production plant would have been highly contaminated, thus shutting down operations. I'll never forget how a tragic situation almost occurred that day and only by the grace of God was I walking by and saw the potential hazard. I still wonder about the forklift driver who was handling the damaged and leaking packages at the offsite storage location.
Your channels are informative even I'm not studying in your respective fields. Good Job!
This channel alone makes me want to become an CSBC investigator 🕵️
Isn’t Mercaptan added to Natural Gas to create that awful smekk noticed during a gas leak?
Idk how I found these video but I'm very intrigued
I don't know anything about this kind of work so I find these animations informational so I do have one question. Why was the system designed with the option to vent into a building where people worked, when a hazardous material is able to accidentally make its way into said system? It seems like a deadly problem waiting to happen. Hopefully that actually made sense to someone reading and not just me.
I'm a little surprised a plant working with poisonous and volatile compounds wouldn't have either 1) SCBA gear stored in multiple easy-to-reach locations, for workers to be able to close valves or shut down equipment in the event of an accidental release, or 2) equip teams with smaller breathing masks, with a short-term air supply, intended for immediate evacuation while a better-equipped damage control team is en route.
Drink every time he says methyl mercaptan
The methl mercaptan almost got me
I tried this it did not turn out well for me , now the csb wants to do an animated video about what went wrong.
@@jonathaneweaver1 Investigators learnt that Jonathaneweaver1 did not count the number of methl mercaptan's in the video correctly. It was at this point that the intoxication level exceeded safety limits, resulting in a catastrophic intoxication.
We're already working on it. - USCSB
@@V8SplashMan A Liver Failure Emergency (LFE) was declared, but it was too late.
Do this at a company, and the CSB will do a report on your company and an incident of mass alcohol poisoning.
Excellent video 👏, would you please disclose the animation software used for creating the video.
The company that the USCSB contracts is called Abbott Animation.
This video kept me so engaged and is very well done
At 6:29 did anyone noticed the buttons that looks like a pioneer djm 900 nxs?
These videos do a great job of showing the "What were they thinking?!?!" side to it all.
What music is this, surely it wasn't made purely for this video?
Shut the refinery down and get a Tax write off, pocket the money
Only took 6 years but finally someone indicted for this in January 2021. I won't mention any names but you can look it up.
YOUR SAFETY MATTERS
Not to Dupont
If it's a mercaptan the smell from working around this factory would be horrible. I'm surprised they could find anyone to work there. Good presentation. And DuPont is known for having a serious process safety management program.
This is their best animated video
A TECNOLOGIA sendo agente de Segurança de Processo para evitar, outros, acidentes com produtos perigosos!!! AlexN. Aracaju-Sergipe-Brasil!!!
Does anyone know how I could get the music and effects audio separate from the voice.
Excellent video 👍🏽
CSB do you monitor these comments? We want to Thank the animation. I wish every class was this detailed.
its always good to go back to the USCSB classics
Ahh dupont, the company who poisoned the world forever for a nickel.
This is the best video on your channel.
Awesome Animation and content ❤️🇮🇳
Draining a Venting system inside a closed building. Who designed this?
I had just finished a Turnaround there on night shift when this happened.... I remember hearing about this the morning of, very tragic situation.... The two brothers that died was simply just human emotion... One brother went down, died from the exposure, and the other brother was apart of the 4 other who went to help... He saw his brother down and chose to go in after him, I think any sane man would have done the same thing.
DUPONT AT ITS BEST
Exactly
Upvoted because you used "its" correctly; thank you.
Those vent headers are vibing so hard at 2:42
If methyl mercaptan is dangerous then why have a connection between its feedline and the vent header where it has to be manually opened?
Several reasons- Usually for cleaning/purging of equipment. If just the feed tank needed to be cleared you wouldn't purge through the reactor, you would purge it to the vent header, but only if it were liquid free. These kind of connections are absolutely necessary for maintenance to be performed, but what happened here was during troubleshooting which is a much more difficult situation to deal with.
It still shocks me that people just walk away from a currently running, ad-hoc chemical process "hey let's go take a coffee break, this doesn't need eyes on it at all times". As always a very well done video, and a sad one.
I like these. They make me feel smart for knowing not to mix things and having a basic understanding o fchemistry
(I'm not saying these professionals don't know that btw)
Narrator is a boss.
anyone know the music name used in the background?
also a very sad series of events as system after system failed to human oversight.
Why am I addicted to CSB videos?!
Great job on the animation. Sad story for the workers.
I was waiting for the voice to go all "but unbeknownst to the herd of wildebeasts, there is danger lurking underneath the deceptively calm surface of the pool. A vacuum inside this Nile crocodile's stomach has been steadily building up over the last twenty-four hours..."