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| West Pharmaceuticals Explosion Kinston, North Carolina January 29, 2003 Killed 6, Injured 38 |
| The explosion at West Pharmaceutical Services, which makes syringes and other plastic medical supplies, occurred about 1:30 p.m. while more than 100 workers were on the job. The fire charred nearby woods and gutted the massive complex. A makeshift triage center was set up on the lawn outside the factory, with medical helicopters and ambulances rushing the injured to hospitals. Authorities recommended residents within a mile radius around the plant to evacuate. The explosion was so powerful it blew doors open on houses more than a mile away and sent debris flying, with some pieces landing more than two miles away. Among those rescued were three or four workers who were clinging to steel beams in a second-story penthouse area when rescuers arrived. Each had suffered second- and third-degree burns. CSB investigators concluded that the blast at West was caused by the ignition of a significant amount of polyethylene dust, which had accumulated above a suspended ceiling over a production area where slabs of rubber were made. |
| Imperial Foods Fire Hamlet, N.C. September 3, 2001 25 Killed, 50+ Injured |
| A fire at the Imperial Foods plant in September 1991 killed 25 workers and injured more than 50 others. Sometime after 8 a.m., a hydraulic line ruptured spewing cooking oil into flames heating a 26 foot-long fat fryer in the middle of the plant. Soaring flames ignited insulating material in the roof, adding more toxic fumes to the oil smoke. People were unable to escape because the factory's exit doors were locked. The plant owner had ordered that the doors be kept locked to prevent workers from stealing chicken parts, going outside for coffee breaks, and to keep insects from getting inside the plant. Most of the victims died of smoke inhalation. Several employees sought sanctuary behind the heavy metal doors of two huge flash freezers on both sides of the plant. Dressed for the warm Carolina summer day, they froze to death in temperatures as low as minus 28 degrees. |
| The Coal Glen Mining Disaster Farmville, Chatham County, N.C. May 27, 1925 53 Killed |
| The Coal Glen-Farmville Mine Disaster was the worst industrial accident in North Carolina history. At 9:40 in the morning on May 27, 1925, a massive explosion shook the town of Coal Glen, N.C. The blast came from the Deep River Coal Field, where local miners were working nearly a thousand feet underground. The explosion, probably touched off by either coal dust or natural gas, was devastating: 53 miners were killed. Thirty-eight (38) women were left widows. Seventy-nine (79) children were left fatherless. The accident virtually put an end to coal mining in North Carolina. The tragedy helped to speed passage of the state's Workers' Compensation Act, passed in 1929. North Carolina was the forty-fourth state to pass such legislation. |