Live support chatEngineering Ethics: Combustible Dust Explosion at Georgia Imperial Sugar Plant
In Engineering Ethics: Combustible Dust Explosion at Georgia Imperial Sugar Plant, you'll learn ...
- The circumstances leading up to the deadly dust explosion in Port Wentworth, GA
- Errors and shortcomings that led to the accumulation of large amounts of dust at the facility
- Warning signs that were not heeded by employees or management in the plant
- Ethical implications of this case that can be applied in your own professional practice
Overview
Preview a portion of this course before purchasing it.
Credit: 2 PDH
Length: 38 pages
On February 7, 2008, the community of Port Wentworth, Georgia was rocked by several explosions at the Imperial Sugar Company plant.
The explosions resulted in 14 fatalities and injured another 36 people.
While the disaster was shocking, it wasn’t without warning.
There were several events causing fires in prior years at this facility that were ignored, having caused only minor inconveniences.
Top levels of management all the way down to the line employees had normalized a poor engineering and safety culture.
In this course, you'll learn about the factors that contributed to cause and the severity of this disaster: poor housekeeping, lack of engineering design and engineered controls, normalization of deviance, and poor emergency response.
You'll see how the hazards associated with combustible dust were ignored and how conveyor and fire detection and suppression systems were inadequate.
You'll learn how the design of equipment facilitated the accumulation of deadly combustible dust particles.
In short, you'll learn what deficiencies were present in the plant's design, safety culture, and emergency response so that you can apply these learnings to the hazard reviews for your projects.
Finally, you’ll learn the ethical implications of this case that can be applied in your own professional practice.
Specific Knowledge or Skill Obtained
This course teaches the following specific knowledge and skills:
- What caused the explosion at the Port Wentworth, GA plant in 2008
- The characteristics of combustible dust
- How poor housekeeping and safety culture contributed to the incident
- The definition of normalized deviance and how it drives a poor safety culture
- How limited Professional Engineering involvement in the design might have contributed to the disaster
- How engineering ethics can play into events like this for Professional Engineers
- How to respond if you find yourself working at a company with ethical issues and a poor safety culture
Certificate of Completion
You will be able to immediately print a certificate of completion after passing a multiple-choice quiz consisting of 18 questions. PDH credits are not awarded until the course is completed and quiz is passed.
| This course is applicable to professional engineers in: | ||
| Alabama (P.E.) | Alaska (P.E.) | Arkansas (P.E.) |
| Delaware (P.E.) | District of Columbia (P.E.) | Florida (P.E. Other Topics) |
| Georgia (P.E.) | Idaho (P.E.) | Illinois (P.E.) |
| Illinois (S.E.) | Indiana (P.E.) | Iowa (P.E.) |
| Kansas (P.E.) | Kentucky (P.E.) | Louisiana (P.E.) |
| Maine (P.E.) | Maryland (P.E.) | Michigan (P.E.) |
| Minnesota (P.E.) | Mississippi (P.E.) | Missouri (P.E.) |
| Montana (P.E.) | Nebraska (P.E.) | Nevada (P.E.) |
| New Hampshire (P.E.) | New Jersey (P.E.) | New Mexico (P.E.) |
| New York (P.E.) | North Carolina (P.E.) | North Dakota (P.E.) |
| Ohio (P.E. Self-Paced) | Oklahoma (P.E.) | Oregon (P.E.) |
| Pennsylvania (P.E.) | South Carolina (P.E.) | South Dakota (P.E.) |
| Tennessee (P.E.) | Texas (P.E.) | Utah (P.E.) |
| Vermont (P.E.) | Virginia (P.E.) | West Virginia (P.E.) |
| Wisconsin (P.E.) | Wyoming (P.E.) | |
Preview a portion of this course before purchasing it.
Credit: 2 PDH
Length: 38 pages
