INPEX: 43-METRE (130-FEET) CHIMNEY SLIPS FROM CRANES DURING REPOSITIONING AT BLAYDIN POINT LNG SITE AND CRASHES TO THE GROUND
February 6, 2015
A 43-metre exhaust
stack weighing more than 50 tonnes has crashed to the ground after slipping
from two cranes at the Inpex-operated LNG project at Blaydin Point near Darwin.
NT WorkSafe is
investigating. No-one was injured.
Unions NT secretary
Paul Kirby said workers told him the chimney was almost vertical when it fell
and it would have created a "pretty loud noise" when it crashed to
earth.
However, an Inpex
spokeswoman said the crane fell from "a short distance above the
ground".
"The stack
dropped the short distance and fell over its pre-lift position," the
spokeswoman said.
"Work in the
area has ceased."
Staff were alerted
to the accident with a letter sent on Thursday night:
During repositioning
of the heating stack the load become detached from the rigging assembly at the
top lifting points resulting in damage as it fell to ground within the
exclusion zone.
The alert also
banned photography and ordered lifts greater than 50-tonnes be suspended.
Security are
patrolling the area and photography's is not permitted of the scene and this
will be enforced.
Mr Kirby complained
Inpex took too long to alert staff and suspend activity.
"My
understanding is that, for a good few hours, there were still large cranes
working on that site," he said.
"It's just
annoying for us that with lightning responses and things like that, information
can get across the site within a matter of minutes, but with significant safety
incidents we can't seem to get information across the site in a reasonable
amount of time."
He said he believed
the crane had been almost vertical when it detached from the rigging and fell.
"It would have
fallen quite some significant distance and would have made a pretty loud noise
when it hit, I imagine," he said.
The Japanese company
Inpex is building LNG trains at Blaydin Point to process natural gas piped 889
kilometres from Browse Basin off the coast of Western Australia.
The facility is part
of the $US34 billion Ichthys project,
which has contributed to a major resources and employment boom in the Northern
Territory.
WorkSafe issued a
statement confirming an "exclusion zone" had been in place before the
lift.
Workplace Health and
Safety Inspectors are currently onsite at Bladin (sic) Point investigating the
cause of yesterday's incident, where a heating stack being lifted by two cranes
fell.
Preliminary findings
show that a risk management plan was in place and an exclusion zone was created
before the lift commenced.
No workers where
present in the exclusion zone when the incident occurred and there were no
injuries as a result of the incident.
The investigation is
still ongoing and no further comments will be provided.