Pollution
Humain
Environnement
Economique

At around 6:45 p.m., a fire erupted on a machine in the workshops of a fabric dyeing and finishing plant. A tenter frame operator detected smoke coming from one of the finishing frames. He removed the fabric from the tenter, opened the steam valve supplying the machine’s four ovens to smother the flames, and then triggered the factory’s alarm. He was able to contain the fire at the exit of the tenter frame with one extinguisher and then put it out with another. The fire brigade arrived at 7:00 p.m. and established a safety perimeter around the tenter. The power supply was disconnected. The fire in the exhaust duct was extinguished with a water hose at 7:30 p.m.

The machine was damaged, and the tenter frame was unavailable. A specialised company cleaned the entire installation, and the 35 employees present were evacuated for 2 hours. Property damage and operating losses amounted to 50 k€ and 150 k€, respectively.

The fire was attributed to 2 factors:

  • a crack on the tenter frame’s flame distribution tee on the burner (equipment fatigue);
  • fabric flock present in a corner of the combustion chamber inside the tenter frame.

The configuration around the fan caused the flock to accumulate. Over the past four months, an intense amount of polar fabrics had passed through the frame, producing a lot of fibres. The risks associated with the presence of flock, such as tee fatigue, had not been identified in the manufacturer’s maintenance instructions nor internally by any feedback.

Following the accident, the operator implemented the following plan:

  • modify the injection of steam on the frame to cover the flue’s entrance and exit so that flames could not escape from the frames;
  • revise the annual maintenance instructions for the frames to include a visual inspection of the condition of the burners’ distribution tees (risk of cracking);
  • invest in a new distribution tee to replace the cracked element.