DANVERS — Water Street resident James Turcotte lived through the Danversport blast nearly 31âÑ2 years ago.
To prevent such an explosion from happening elsewhere in the state, Turcotte has become the driving force behind a bill on Beacon Hill to license those who operate the type of low-pressure boilers he says were once found at the former Water Street ink and coatings plant.
The plant blew up at 2:46 a.m. on Nov. 22, 2006, and damaged or destroyed dozens of homes and buildings, cars, and boats at a nearby marina.
"We came down the stairs, and the front windows were gone, the side windows were gone and the walls were cracked," Turcotte said, recounting what he found in his home that night.
Turcotte knows a thing or two about boilers as he works as the chief engineer in charge of the large boilers at the Hogan Regional Center in Danvers. He is also the president of the state Chapter 146 Association, a group that aims to preserve a strong license law for those who operate boilers.
Turcotte says training and licensing could have prevented the blast by tightening the requirements for those who operate low-pressure boilers used in manufacturing plants.
"Jimmy has always made the point," said state Rep. Ted Speliotis, D-Danvers, "and I agree with him — the lack of training for the person operating the steam boiler was the real cause of that explosion."
The bill would require all steam boilers used in manufacturing "to be operated by a licensed operator who has to check it every four hours and keep a document of it," Speliotis said.
The move is opposed by at least one industry association.
Under the bill, a low-pressure boiler operator's license would be renewed every five years and require 30 hours of training.
It was a key finding of federal investigators who looked into the Danversport blast that a steam valve at the plant was inadvertently left open on an unsealed mix tank that lacked automatic shutoff controls. The investigators' report says this led to the blast, and the bill aims to address this finding.
Investigators for the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board said with the steam valve left open, a volatile ink mixture in a tank boiled, filled the plant with flammable vapors and eventually ignited.
The report also found the ink plant lacked "written procedures and or checklists to facilitate safe process operations."
Experts hired by Georgetown-based CAI, one of the plant's former owners, have disputed this finding, but it is central to the bill Speliotis and Turcotte are pushing.
"By licensing, you have training," said Speliotis, the bill's lead sponsor, during a visit with Turcotte to the vacant site of the explosion on Water Street on Friday.
"Accountability," Turcotte said of the bill, which aims to cut down on human error.
The Associated Industries of Massachusetts, a nonprofit, nonpartisan association of employers, does not favor the bill.
"It is completely unnecessary," said Robert Rio, senior vice president with AIM who used to work at the Salem power plant. "I don't know why this is coming up other than to make more work."
Turcotte said AIM was behind a change in Chapter 146 in 1996 that eliminated licensing requirements for low-pressure processed steam boilers, something Rio disputes.
Rio said Chapter 146, which is outdated in its requirements, needs to be overhauled and not addressed in piecemeal fashion.
"I don't think the licensing requirements in this law would've made a difference," Rio said, adding that AIM would never defend a company that violates the law.
The bill appears to be gaining momentum.
On March 3, it passed a major hurdle when the committee Speliotis chairs, the Joint Committee on Consumer Protection and Professional Licensure, gave it a favorable recommendation. The bill is co-sponsored by Sen. Fred Berry, Senate majority leader, D-Peabody.
"What it means for the companies, they are going to have someone on their line ... with a first fireman's license," Turcotte said. Such jobs advertise for $15 an hour, and training can be done online. Courses cost about $1,200.
This law does not require continuous monitoring of the boiler, as some facilities do for some high-pressure boilers.
"It's accountability for not a lot of money," Turcotte said. "I don't want anyone to go through what we went through in this neighborhood."
Staff writer Ethan Forman can be reached at 978-338-2673 or eforman@salemnews.com.
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