Management states that “three projects were underway in the nitrocellulose refining area” at the time of the accident, Wednesday August 3, which injured eight people.
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New progress report in the internal investigation carried out by the Eurenco group, which owns the Manuco factory, located in Bergerac (Dordogne), where three explosions injured eight people on Wednesday August 3. A phenomenon of “flash” light was observed just before the series of three detonations which hit the site during a “piping assembly site” the group’s management announced on Monday.
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“The observed phenomenon is a sort of luminous flash which then triggered a first explosion, followed by a fire and two other explosions”, summarized the CEO of Eurenco Thierry Francou, joined by AFP. Management states that “three projects were underway in the nitrocellulose refining area” at the time of the accident. “The first concerned pipe assembly work on a tank, the second routine maintenance of refiners and the third concerned maintenance on electrical installations”detailed Eurenco in a press release.
According to “the first testimonies”, “a flash would have occurred in the area of the piping assembly site where an operation to reconnect a new pipe to the existing installations was being carried out”. “The causes of this reaction remain to be clarified” but this operation would have triggered “a first explosion in the northern part of the building then resulting in a fire and two other explosions”explained Eurenco.
Note that the internal investigation “calls on internal and external experts but also on the employee representative elected to the CSSCT (specific commission created within the social and economic committee, which deals with issues of health, safety and working conditions) of Manuco”said the management.
In parallel, two other procedures are carried out. One, judicial, was opened by the Bergerac public prosecutor’s office while an administrative investigation is also being conducted by the Bureau of Investigation and Analysis of Accidental Risks, created in December 2020 after the Lubrizol accident in Rouen.