Arc Flash Fatality Video.wmv — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:26this particular night things were pretty
2. 0:28normal that's just that a person didn't
3. 0:33stay focused
4. 0:35everything was down and you can just
5. 0:37feel the steel in there it was like you
6. 0:39just know something was wrong
7. 0:42his worst thing I've ever seen in my
8. 0:44life useless he should've happened I'm
9. 0:49got a an image burned into my mind we'll
10. 0:52probably be there forever someone lost
11. 0:56their life for nothing
12. 0:58we lost it for you and he Smith's folks
13. 1:02missing
14. 1:09On January 18th 2001 eddie adams OSB
15. 1:14mill shift electrician in Elkin North
16. 1:16Carolina lost his life as a result of
17. 1:19burns received from the explosion of a
18. 1:2123 hundred volt starter Eddie left
19. 1:24behind his wife two children and
20. 1:26countless friends Eddie's friends and
21. 1:29co-workers produced the following
22. 1:31program in order to share their thoughts
23. 1:33and to prevent a tragedy like this from
24. 1:35ever happening again as we go through
25. 1:40this door we're entering the MCC room
26. 1:43number 1 which is the location of the
27. 1:48starter camp well anytime you go in the
28. 1:49MCC room you're supposed to have a you
29. 1:51know a partner and anytime you know
30. 1:53you've got a job and you can't do it
31. 1:54safely yourself you have to ask for
32. 1:56somebody to take you know hey come help
33. 1:57me a little bit and that's one of the
34. 1:59first mistakes he made he came in here
35. 2:01which this is the same room
36. 2:03will by itself nobody knew where is that
37. 2:05I'm not saying it nobody never goes in
38. 2:08there by themself you know I'm sure they
39. 2:10think well maybe I fix this right here
40. 2:12real quick I'll go check it out as we
41. 2:16come through the MCC room we have most
42. 2:19of our 480-volt cans located in this
43. 2:23area as we get down further toward the
44. 2:28end of the MCC room all of our 2,300
45. 2:31volt and high-voltage type of starter
46. 2:34camps are located down in this area they
47. 2:37had an issue with the hog motor cutting
48. 2:39out and that's what Eddie was working on
49. 2:40at the time of the fatality hog grinds
50. 2:42up our barking and waste material a hog
51. 2:45was down and the hog had failed
52. 2:47it wasn't a tremendous upset condition
53. 2:49it wasn't a life-or-death situation it
54. 2:52wasn't something that was so critical to
55. 2:55the process that it had to be done right
56. 2:57now this is the actual starter Ken that
57. 3:01Eddy came to work on as you can see it's
58. 3:06no longer in operation when we were at
59. 3:11the point that we were able to go ahead
60. 3:13and start putting the equipment back on
61. 3:15line this was damaged to the point that
62. 3:17we couldn't use it any longer
63. 3:19when Eddie came in to work on this piece
64. 3:22of equipment he had to have pulled the
65. 3:26handle down on the starter to do a
66. 3:31lockout this particular piece of
67. 3:33equipment you can't open the door unless
68. 3:36you disconnect the breaker there's no
69. 3:39way that you can open that can without
70. 3:41throwing the disconnects down you
71. 3:44Dewar's so he throwed it down he did
72. 3:46that part right but once he got in there
73. 3:48he throwed the breaker back up so then
74. 3:52it was loud when he did that he used a
75. 3:56multimeter and was using a multimeter
76. 3:58and we feel like that maybe he was
77. 4:01trying to check the fuses to see if he
78. 4:03had a blown fuse he thought he was on
79. 4:04600 volt has 600 altimeter foods across
80. 4:09phases of a 2,300 volt system even
81. 4:12though it was marked all over it and
82. 4:13there were all kinds of indicators he
83. 4:15was in a twenty three hundred volt panel
84. 4:16he didn't recognize it you can't check
85. 4:19twenty three hundred volts with a
86. 4:20thousand volt meter as he attempted to
87. 4:22do that whatever he did inside this box
88. 4:26created an arc with an explosion and as
89. 4:37the explosion or as that the starter
90. 4:39exploded of course a ball of fire came
91. 4:41out into Eddie's face we found Eddie's
92. 4:44hard hat here on the floor along with
93. 4:46his multimeter that had blown up it had
94. 4:49melted we know that from the impact that
95. 4:52Eddie was slammed into this cabinet here
96. 4:55we also found evidence of some tissue
97. 4:58and some hair on the panel itself when
98. 5:06the explosion took place every light in
99. 5:07the meal went off so we feel like it was
100. 5:10probably dark in here for a few seconds
101. 5:12and Eddie was on fire the dryers started
102. 5:15on fire they got fire suppression
103. 5:17signals that the suppression system was
104. 5:20activated no one knew what had happened
105. 5:22most people assume there had been a
106. 5:24power outage while there had been but
107. 5:28immediately no one understood that that
108. 5:30power outage is because the circuit was
109. 5:35shorted through Eddie Adams Eddie turned
110. 5:38at that point
111. 5:42and when in this direction there was a
112. 5:47small table type device sitting here and
113. 5:50it appears as though Eddie either
114. 5:51slipped or bumped into the table we
115. 5:54found his watch
116. 5:56we found some coins and some bits of
117. 6:00clothing laying on the floor here so it
118. 6:02appears as though Eddie might have
119. 6:03slipped and stumbled into this table he
120. 6:07got up and went in this direction
121. 6:09starting towards this door and we feel
122. 6:14like that Eddie realized that he was not
123. 6:17going to be able to get out this door so
124. 6:19he turned and started back in this
125. 6:20direction there was a roll around tool
126. 6:23box sitting here with some plastic
127. 6:26covers over the top and his Eddie went
128. 6:29by he swiped that top and it actually
129. 6:32melted the covers there he also started
130. 6:36on through here and again we found bits
131. 6:41and pieces of clothing throughout this
132. 6:43area he opened this door and went out
133. 6:50into the blending area it's pretty
134. 6:52obvious to tell what he did he took this
135. 6:55and took his meter probably laid it on
136. 6:58the floor down he had to squat down more
137. 6:59likely and you can see from the curtain
138. 7:03from the heat right here or the fireball
139. 7:05started
140. 7:05he put his meter on there just like that
141. 7:07as soon as he did it that was it blowed
142. 7:09the fireball blow dryer between me and
143. 7:12you can see the heat has melted the fuse
144. 7:14essentially welded defuses here's welded
145. 7:17stamps together all the fireball was
146. 7:20right here in front of his face and when
147. 7:22it blowed it blowed up in the energy
148. 7:24from that fireball caught him on fire
149. 7:26and
150. 7:28the rest is pretty much history this guy
151. 7:30was burnt plumb out of his clothes I
152. 7:32mean they was it was a t-shirt band the
153. 7:35waistband in his and his belt was all
154. 7:38that was on him I mean that was all that
155. 7:40was on he took it upon himself to go in
156. 7:43and try and do the last steps of
157. 7:45troubleshooting before making a decision
158. 7:47to change the motor and for whatever
159. 7:51reason what he was working on was not
160. 7:54foremost in his mind at that time and
161. 7:57what he was doing was not communicated
162. 7:59to others and others didn't ask
163. 8:01questions of Eddie I think in this case
164. 8:03we had somebody who was really anxious
165. 8:05to help as the pastor said at the
166. 8:07service Eddie would drop anything to
167. 8:10help you if you needed some help he
168. 8:11would drop whatever he's doing and come
169. 8:13over and help you they do that at home
170. 8:14he do that in the in the community do
171. 8:17that all the time and I think that
172. 8:19behavior I'll run and fix it I'll take
173. 8:22care of it because I know what to do
174. 8:23I'll run in there and I'll fix it is a
175. 8:27behavior that we have to watch as he
176. 8:31came through the door it appears as
177. 8:32though he slipped again we also found
178. 8:34some fluids body fluids
179. 8:42he proceeded to go up next to the forum
180. 8:45line
181. 8:47and down the former
182. 8:50and of course it is he was going down
183. 8:52the forum line it was still dark and
184. 8:56and different spots along the forum on
185. 8:58here we found pieces of his clothes some
186. 9:01of them told me that they had seen him
187. 9:02from you know from across the meal you
188. 9:07know and seeing something was on fire
189. 9:09and thought you know what is that on
190. 9:11fire and then go to look at it and see
191. 9:13that it is somebody after they put the
192. 9:17fire out in his body they brought him
193. 9:19into her station here's where they
194. 9:21started to administer first aid of
195. 9:26course at this time also a control
196. 9:28operator was on the phone with the
197. 9:30emergency response organizations in the
198. 9:33area every time the phone rings now
199. 9:35after nine o'clock and evening the fear
200. 9:38God runs right through me because it
201. 9:39could be the same phone call again and
202. 9:42watch a phone call that nobody ever
203. 9:44wants to get Jeff and I drove over to
204. 9:46Cathy's house we had to call Cathy from
205. 9:49the driveway inform her that we need to
206. 9:52talk to her Eddie was conscious and he
207. 9:54was still focused and was able to talk
208. 9:56with our first responders and with the
209. 9:59EMTs and really until we got to Winston
210. 10:01and and talked to the doctors down there
211. 10:04and kind of seen how the the trauma team
212. 10:06acted when we got to him or when they
213. 10:08got to him I knew then that you know
214. 10:11this is pretty grim as he talked with
215. 10:14the EMTs that were that transported him
216. 10:17to winston-salem he also told them that
217. 10:21he thought he was on 440 or 480 and that
218. 10:24he had really screwed up big-time
219. 10:25carelessness really it was it was
220. 10:29something that you just don't rush into
221. 10:32anytime you're dealing with electricity
222. 10:34you just don't rush into it you almost
223. 10:36have to try to get hurt you have to do
224. 10:40something that violates the policy
225. 10:41something that violates common sense no
226. 10:45yes sir there's something totally off
227. 10:47the wall to get hurt again Eddie was
228. 10:49alert and was able to talk with the EMTs
229. 10:52as they were transporting him to the
230. 10:54hospital
231. 10:58and the next day Eddie died
232. 11:16Elkins said no don't come we don't want
233. 11:18anything to do with the film
234. 11:20leave us alone let us be don't in Veda
235. 11:23and when they thought about it and you
236. 11:26realized that there might be a little
237. 11:29window to help the rest of the company
238. 11:31and the people we care about from going
239. 11:33through this they said okay I'll take
240. 11:36some more pain if by doing the video if
241. 11:38we can prevent one mill or one person
242. 11:41from having a tragic event similar to
243. 11:44this one then it's been worthwhile but I
244. 11:46thought maybe if I could just say
245. 11:48anything to help somebody in safety just
246. 11:51think twice about something before you
247. 11:53do it am I ready to be focused am I
248. 11:55ready to go in and do my job do it
249. 11:56safely so I can go home at the end of
250. 11:58the day in as good a shape that was when
251. 12:00I got there someone lost their wife for
252. 12:02nothing that they people they lost their
253. 12:06life to me nothing I don't want that to
254. 12:10happen again
255. 12:12attained me not at my facility or
256. 12:17anybody else
257. 12:36anytime you want to test your electrical
258. 12:39circuits to make sure that they're not
259. 12:41energized after you've locked it out and
260. 12:42you're going to be working on it you
261. 12:44always want to use two meters one you
262. 12:46use the tick tracer right here and pull
263. 12:50up below 600 volts you can hold it
264. 12:52without the hostage but when you go
265. 12:54above 600 volts you need to hold it with
266. 12:56the hot steam and also use a second
267. 12:59meter any time for a tea or blow that
268. 13:02once you get above 600 then you want to
269. 13:06use this hot stick always you're going
270. 13:09to want wire your proper rated gloves
271. 13:12and your face shield keep in mind who
272. 13:15you always want to partner with either
273. 13:16one 600 above and below
274. 14:23you