Overview

• Search-and-rescue crews remain on site after Monday’s explosions killed one worker, injured about ten others and left one person unaccounted for at the North Versailles plant
• Officials report the blasts originated in the facility’s reversing room between coking batteries 13 and 15, and company and federal investigators are probing the cause
• Allegheny County declared a level-3 mass-casualty incident to deploy fire, EMS and state resources, with injured employees treated at UPMC Mercy and Allegheny Health Network
• The Allegheny County Health Department has advised residents within one mile to shelter indoors while air-quality monitors report no exceedances of federal particulate or sulfur dioxide standards
• Clairton Coke Works, North America’s largest coking facility with about 1,400 employees, has a history of prior fires, explosions and pollution lawsuits that has renewed calls for safety and maintenance reviews