Photo: NIOSH
Case report number: 71-265-2025
Issued by: Washington State Fatality Assessment and Control Evaluation Program
Date of report: April 18, 2025
A 53-year-old day laborer had worked for his employer, a general contractor, for four years doing random jobs. He and an assistant were installing vinyl flooring in a commercial building under renovation. They were working unsupervised but received instruction from the employer over the phone. The liquid flooring adhesive was not bonding well. The laborer said the room was too cold and decided to use an open-flame propane torch to heat up the adhesive and flooring. Forty minutes later, the torch ignited either the adhesive vapor or the floor liquid. The workers tried to stamp out the fire but were unsuccessful. The assistant yelled at the laborer to run for an exit door. He then felt an explosion, looked back and saw the laborer trying to shut off the torch as smoke filled the room. Dizzy and nauseated, he yelled again to the laborer but lost sight of him. When he reached the door, a second explosion threw him outside. The laborer emerged shortly after, in flames and screaming. He fell just before a third explosion. The area around him was too hot for the assistant to approach. Neighbors called 911. First responders rescued the assistant and extinguished the blaze. The laborer died at the scene from burns and smoke inhalation. Investigators found that the employer did not have an incident prevention program or provide Safety Data Sheets, chemical hazard training and fire extinguishers before the job began. The SDS for the liquid adhesive indicated it had a high risk of explosion at a low vapor concentration in the air. The adhesive spread over the large surface area in the unventilated building emitted enough vapor to reach the lower explosive limit and ignite when the torch was lit. Four 5-gallon buckets of adhesive were left open in the building, increasing the vapor concentration.
To help prevent similar occurrences, employers should:
- Develop incident prevention programs that include a written chemical hazard communication program. Programs should require container warning labels, obtaining current SDSs and making them available, supplementing exposure controls with PPE, and providing training.
- Conduct a pre-work site hazard analysis to identify chemical hazards and explosion risks, monitor for worker exposures, and prepare emergency response plans for uncontrolled releases and fires.
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Original article published by Safety+Health an NSC publication