May 27th, 2008

Source: RadioFarda.com

Ali Agha-Zadeh, the regional commander of Shazand from the Markazi (Central) province announced two day after the explosion and blaze at the two chemical factories located in this region, that the latest count of the deceased in this incident were twenty six dead (26) and fifty (50) injured.

According to the Islamic Student News Agency (ISNA), the regional commander, discussed the necessity for the preparation of the hygienic and security conditions of the workplace, from the standpoint of clean-up of the area of the fire and the presence of chemical pollutants.

Also, Ali Agha-Zadeh told the Mehr news agency: “At present fifty (50) people members of clean-up crews, aid, area security are hard at work in professional and specialist teams.”

The environmental aftermath

Do the chemical pollutants pose a threat to that area’s environment and those residents who were present at the time of the incident?

Stephan Bjorkqvist, a Swedish fire specialist and investigator from the Stockholm fire department union discussed this issue with Radio Farda and said: “This incident is not strictly an environmental disaster as alcohol, Butane and oil gas are used on a daily basis in houses, automobiles and other machinery. This is not dangerous, because most of the products that burn, turn into smoke and go up into the air; this is not dangerous for people. The danger that people face is if they were directly in the path of the fire. They must immediately leave the area and breathe in fresh air.”

However in this case, Dr. Esmail Kahrom, environmental specialist from Tehran, expressed an entirely different opinion regarding this matter. He told Radio Farda: “A chemical factory employs various forms of chemical materials that come in solid, liquid or vapor form in order to produce it’s products. Normally these chemical materials are stored in pipes or tanks that are not harmful to anyone however in the case of an explosion, unfortunately, all of these are distributed through the atmosphere and cause pollution in the air, soil and water. During all of these phases the people who are in the vicinity will certainly be effected and harmed and these can cause eye, pulmonary or nasal injuries.”

Regarding this matter, Siamak Taheri, Tehran-local journalist spoke to the Radio Farda reporter indicating other such instances, in other areas around the world, where extensive and active measure had to be taken. As a first step, the entire area’s residents must be evacuated and they must be taken to safe and secure areas. And then attention must be paid to the issue of the kind of pollutants that the explosion would have caused and whether these pollutants have seeped into the underground waters or not and then to have  the necessary investigations and steps must be taken .  Also in some cases  the area of the incident must be washed and purified with specific foams so that the spread of pollutants into the environment is avoided.”

It is important to mention that the Kimia Gostar Sepehr and Kimia-garawn’eh Emrooz, are located in the industrial township of Shaheed Babaii of Bawzaneh which houses thirty five (35) large industrial units which are mainly made up of subsidiaries petrochemical plants.

The matter of the presence of chemical pollutants are being discussed under conditions where other problems such as the neglect of safety and the lack of training of the workers on such matters, the lack of safety operators, the absence of a place for fire department tankage and also the destruction of the only aid helicopter of the Markazi (Central) province are key issues which some of the media in Iran has specifically focused on.

Finally, emphasizing on the matter of warning and safety systems in factories in Iran, Dr. Kahrom said: “The factory systems must be such that explosions of this kind don’t ever happen again, however, unfortunately old systems cannot act as a serious preventative against explosions and fire such as the one in Shazand.”

Translated from Persian to English by Planet Iran staff