Forklift foundry furnace explosion - GIF

[somyunguy]

Back when I worked in Phamaceutical manufacture we had an incident , the day shift had fallen behind in SVP (Small Volume Parenterals) on a batch of drug with a high hydrogen peroxide content.
Come tea time , everybody went on tea except for one fellow who took it upon himself to unload the sterilised batch from the Autoclave to try and make up some time.

The Autoclave operators had strict instructions never to unload a batch of this specific drug before ambient temperature had been reached.

Unfortunately , this fellow for some reason , ignored this , obviously thinking the temp was low enough to be safe , the forklift went in ok , lifted cleanly but on the way out , as the wheels crossed the land between the floor and the mouth of the Autoclave , the load jogged , the vials cracked together and the whole trolley load exploded.

The forklift was equipped with a screen but this melted and covered the operator entirely over his front , melted his cleansuit into his flesh , he died 3 days later.

When we visited in ICU , all he could say was "Please don't touch me!!"

I used to drill my maintenance guys - Always find out what the product is and NEVER ever open a hot Autoclave for any reason!!