Dust explosion in sugar silo tower Investigation and lessons learnt

摘要

On 21 July 2003, a dust explosion occurred in the sugar silo facility at the British Sugar Refinery in Cantley, Norfolk. The explosion propagated through large parts of the facility, having its greatest impact in the bucket elevators and dust extraction system. At the time of the explosion, the plant was not operational but was undergoing maintenance and modifications which involved welding on one of the bucket elevators known as the silo feed bucket elevator, to attach support frames onto the elevator casing for out of alignment detectors. Incidents such as this clearly cause extensive damage, injury and even death, and when they occur it is essential to learn as much as possible from them. It is for this reason that HSE/HSL and British Sugar decided to produce this paper, which describes key features of the explosion and its impact on the site.