Alert over refrigeration gas

The fire at the Icepak Coolstores building at Tamahere. Photo / Doug Sherring

Department of Labour officials have posted an alert on their website after finding "disturbing" parallels between a May incident, in which a refrigeration technician was burnt by exploding hydrocarbon-based refrigerant, and the fatal Icepak coolstore explosion, which killed a senior Hamilton fire officer.

The South Auckland technician was burned on his face and hands doing maintenance on a coolstore refrigeration unit which was marked as containing non-flammable R22 gas, known as Freon, when it was actually full of a volatile hydrocarbon-based refrigerant.

The coolstore fire two years earlier in the Hamilton suburb of Tamahere killed Hamilton firefighter Derek Lovell and seven others were injured in a huge explosion and fire.

In each case there were no warnings that the systems contained a hydrocarbon gas.

The technician was five metres up a ladder welding at a valve when gas left in the line exploded and sent an expanding ball of fire directly into his face. "This incident bears some disturbing similarities to the coolstore fire at Tamahere in 2008 and therefore is seen as extremely serious," officials said.

The department has recommended, "employers, owners, persons in control of coolstores should immediately determine the substance their refrigeration unit/s are charged with".

- NZPA