Latest update November 1st, 2024 12:59 AM
Govt. investigators probing deadly rice factory explosion
A team of investigators from the Ministry of Labour has journeyed to Berbice to probe Sunday’s horrific incident in which
Dead: Phillip Gangaprashad, 50
a boiler exploded and killed its operator.
According to Minister of Labour, Nanda Gopaul, yesterday, the initial report could be completed within a week.
The investigators would be attempting to determine the circumstances which led to the death of Phillip Gangaprashad, 50, of Number 47 Village, Corentyne, Berbice.
The operator, a father of three, was killed at Buddy Tulsi Rice Factory early Sunday when the boiler he was working on exploded. With the rice harvesting in full swing for this second crop, Gangaprashad had been holding for the night when tragedy struck.
It is not unknown that workers in the rice industry would work with different operations during harvesting.
It is not the first time that persons were killed at the factory. More than two decades ago, a man also died in another explosion, residents say.
Sunday’s incident reportedly occurred after 07:00hrs. The explosion was felt and heard about a mile away.
According to a co-worker, Roderick Cornelius, he was busy with his duties when he heard a loud explosion.
He instinctively took cover behind a concrete wall, while wood and other debris flew all around him. When he recovered, he saw the operator’s badly burnt body lying on the ground not far away. The force of the boiler’s explosion had thrown him against a wall. The boiler itself had been lifted from its foundations and was hurled backwards, but not before knocking out the entire front wall of the bond, located 40 feet away.
The shed under which the boiler rests was badly damaged. So were several bags of paddy in the bond.
Cornelius said that Gangaprashad, who he described as a seasoned operator, had been feeding the boiler at the time with “boosi”, which is waste matter from milled paddy.
The aftermath: The boiler was hurled from its foundation, under this shed. The blast killed the operator.
Gangaprashad’s supervisor, Junior Richardson, who witnessed the explosion, was in a state of shock when this newspaper visited the location. He said that he heard a loud bang and saw Gangaprashad’s body lying motionless next to the boiler in the compound of the rice mill.
“I ain’t got no idea how it happened; the police [are] investigating it,” he told this newspaper.
Richardson said that he picked up the man’s lifeless body and rushed him to the Skeldon Hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival.
At the home of the dead man, his shocked wife, Banmattie, 43, said her husband of 24 years left the night before to work at the mill.
It was around 08:00hrs on Sunday when the family received news from a cousin of the operator that he was badly injured in an explosion. The cousin had also been working there at the time.
The family said that the operator is highly experienced and not a permanent staff of that factory. Rather, he was only asked to work for the night there. It is middle of harvesting for the second crop now.
The family of the operator said that officials of the mills have been in contact with them, with the wife of the owner making arrangements to fly into the country from overseas.
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