Toner Dust Cited As Cause Of Minor Fire At Konica Minolta

[PFDRes47cue 653]

GOSHEN - Hazardous materials officials gave the all-clear after examining a structure fire at Konica Minolta in Goshen where copy toner dust had caught fire.

Don't think I ever heard a toner dust starting a fire! Pretty bizarre!

Recordonline.com

[PFDRes47cue 653]

Passed along from another member...

I will admit, it is quite an unusual situation, and you may have heard of some of these phenomena, which one wouldn't really initially think are plausible or likely to happen. Sugar and flour causing devastating explosions demolishing factories?

Of course, some of us understand the principles, just one of those things, ya know?

http://en.wikipedia....inery_explosion

http://www.wired.com...he-explosive-t/

[SRS131EMTFF 471]

Passed along from another member...

We recently studied the Imperial Sugar Explosion in my Hazardous Materials class. It goes back to the idea of surface area, what burns better, a block of wood, or that same block of wood shaved into saw dust? Obviously the saw dust, now while one may not think that sugar or in this case toner dust might be flammable, anything given an LEL and heat will explode and combust. In the case of Imperial Sugar, a ball-bearing in a conveyor belt overheated and with enough sugar dust in the air it exploded and 14 people died. Safety systems that should have been in place either failed or were non-existent. Relevant OSHA standards for the Toner Explosions:

29CFR1910.22 Housekeeping

29CFR1910.307 Hazardous Locations

29CFR1910.1200 Hazard Communication

General Duty Clause, Section 5(a)(1)

OSHA Advisory on Combustible Dust:

http://www.osha.gov/OshDoc/data_General_Facts/OSHAcombustibledust.pdf

Imperial CSB report below:

http://www.csb.gov/UserFiles/file/Imperial%20Sugar%20Report%20Final%20updated.pdf

Edited February 18, 2011 by bvfdjc316