Slag Pit Blast at East Chicago Steel Mill Being Probed

EAST CHICAGO, Ind. (AP) — The state of Indiana is investigating a slag pit explosion at a northwestern Indiana metal mill, it mentioned Tuesday.

The explosion Sunday in a uncooked supplies part of the sprawling Cleveland-Cliffs Indiana Harbor West mill on the Lake Michigan shoreline “was attributable to rainwater assembly the new slag,” the Indiana Division of Environmental Administration mentioned.

“IDEM has not noticed any supplies or particles falling from the sky,” the division mentioned. “The content material of the plume could be predominately particulate matter related to the slag.”

The explosion despatched up a cloud of smoke seen from greater than 20 miles (32 kilometers) away, The Occasions of Northwest Indiana reported.

“Cleveland-Cliffs’ contractor is answerable for taking precautions to forestall a lot of these explosions from occurring, and they’re at present investigating the incident,” IDEM mentioned.

Nobody was injured within the explosion on the facility that turns slag into cement and is operated by contractor Lafarge North America, Cleveland-Cliffs spokeswoman Patricia Persico mentioned.

A number of small fires on the mill had been extinguished, she mentioned.

Slag is a extremely unstable byproduct of steelmaking liable to exploding when blended with water.

“With slag, it appears to be like and sounds worse than it’s,” Persico mentioned.

United Steelworkers Union District 7 Director Mike Millsap mentioned the explosion was beneath investigation.

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