State faults engineer, outside inspector in fatal power plant accident

SALEM — The state took disciplinary action yesterday against a former top engineer at Salem Harbor Station and an outside insurance inspector in connection with the steam tube explosion that killed three power plant workers in November.

The Department of Public Safety revoked the license of Steve Dulong, the former engineer-in-charge at the coal and oil-fired power plant, and found insurance inspector Robert Maule of National Union Fire Insurance Co. "incompetent and untrustworthy." It said Maule may lose his state certificate to inspect boilers.

The two men received a lot of the blame for the failure to inspect the lower section of Boiler No. 3 for the past decade. That is where a steam tube exploded on the morning of Nov. 6. State law requires an annual inspection of the entire boiler, the DPS said.

"Based on their actions or inaction, we determined that these two license holders were untruthful and incompetent to hold their licenses, and that is why we have taken action against both of them," Tom Gatzunis, the state commissioner of public safety, said in a telephone interview.

In addition to faulting two individuals, the state also was critical of past ownership and the current owner, Dominion Energy New England, which has operated the plant since 2005.

Plant workers had an "unacceptable tolerance of boiler tube failures and did not have a policy in place to examine other areas of potential concern ..." the 104-page report concludes. Plant workers also failed to notice "early indications of a tube leak," the state said.

In addition, the report states that over the years the plant "went from a preventive maintenance mentality to 'putting out fires.'"

Following the accident, a state inspector determined that all four boilers at Salem Harbor Station were in "dangerous condition" and revoked their inspection certificates. Since then, the boilers have gone through rigorous inspections and have been recertified by the state and are back in operation.

Dominion, the plant owner, said it was "disappointed" with a report that it believes "does not reflect the evidence." The company "strongly disagrees with any suggestion that Dominion or our dedicated employees at Salem Harbor Station did not maintain a safe work environment or failed to operate or maintain our power generating facilities properly."

Dominion said it will continue to review the report and "consider our options to respond."

A union official said he had not yet read the entire report and could not comment in detail.

"There are some issues in there that are probably going to raise some concerns," said Rick Robey, president of IBEW Local 326, which represents Salem Harbor Station workers. However, he said he was certain plant management did not do anything intentional, and that it was more likely there were different understandings or interpretations of inspection regulations.

This is the second investigation to find fault with the plant inspections. In May, the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration reached a similar conclusion when it cited Dominion for failing to inspect the so-called "dead air space" at the bottom of the boiler in more than nine years. Dominion has appealed that finding.

Meanwhile, the criminal investigation into the accident is continuing, according to Steve O'Connell, a spokesman for Essex County District Attorney Jonathan Blodgett. He did not say when the investigation is expected to conclude.

The families of the deceased workers — Mark Mansfield, 41, of Peabody; Philip Robinson, 56, of Beverly; and Mathew Indeglia, 20, of Lawrence — have hired attorneys and are expected to file lawsuits. Attorney Douglas Sheff of Boston, who represents the Mansfield and Robinson families, said he has seen the state report but declined to comment.

The report by the Department of Public Safety concluded that there were serious problems that an inspector should have found, but that went undetected in an area at the base of the 130-foot boiler. A defect in a weld in the original 1957 boiler resulted in a leak that caused "collateral damage" to other parts, the state said.

In effect, the report said that boiler tubes and parts failed from both the inside and outside — and that external corrosion most likely would have been seen if an inspector entered the lower section of the boiler.

The large pile of ash allowed to accumulate at the bottom of the boiler, which routinely got wet from water used to wash the boiler, created conditions ideal for corrosion, the report said. High-pressure steam built up in this area until the day of the accident, when a boiler wall failed, sending 600-degree steam, water and ash under high pressure into a nearby section of the plant where the three workers were performing routine maintenance, according to the findings.

The report indicates that inspections were done, but not to the area of the boiler that failed.

Maule, the insurance inspector, examined Boiler No. 3 seven months before the accident but did not inspect the dead-air space, the report states.

"(Maule) further stated that he did not inspect these spaces based on the fact that his personal past experiences never indicated these areas to be problem areas. He also stated that he looked in all boiler spaces early in his career but stopped this practice as his experience increased. Maule stated that since the failure, he has resumed inspecting all boiler spaces."

Dulong, the plant engineer-in-charge at the time of the accident, said the area "was not opened because Maule did not request the space to be opened," the report states.

In January 2007 — 10 months before the accident — a boiler leak was found in the dead-air space due to "corrosion fatigue at a weld," according to the report. In an interview, a plant worker "indicated that the plant did not look further to determine if the problem was an isolated problem or if the same condition existed at other locations."

According to the report, Dulong relied on other employees, including a quality control person, to determine if further inspections were necessary. "Decisions such as this are the sole responsibility of the engineer-in-charge," the report said.

Concerned that the dead-air space had not been inspected in the Salem Harbor Station boiler, the state ordered inspectors to check 33 similar boilers at plants across Massachusetts. All had been inspected within the year, the state said.

Source: Massachusetts Department of Public Safety, Salem Harbor Station Incident Report, July 31, 2008

Photos

This image from the Department of Public Safety report on the Salem Harbor Station explosion shows the approximate area where three workers were killed after a pipe failed. Courtesy photo