Apprentice suffocates welding inside on a tank.

[Pete.S.]

between 19.5 and 23.5 % is the requirement for oxygen, not enough you eventually pass out and die...too much and you get muscle twitching and so on from free radicals or something like that...im not sure what but I remember reading it somewhere...im pretty sure the numbers are right though.

There is a difference between what the oxygen % is required medically and what levels are required by regulations. The levels you are talking about are the regulatory ones and the levels I'm talking about are the medical ones.

Medically speaking 16% is considered safe and experts has argued that 12.5% should be the limit considered "Immediately Dangerous to Life and Health".
When you fly on a commercial plane the oxygen level in the cabin is the same as 16%. That's the same as a mountain climber at about 7000 ft.

It's actually something called the partial pressure of the oxygen that is what the body needs. So the actual percentages only makes sense at sea level.

We had 2 miners get caught in what we call blackdamp in the mines, which is a lack of oxygen. the air mover got knocked over down in the breast they were workin in and was blowing the wrong way. No one knew it at the time, I was workin in the next breast over from them and went over to theirs to tell them we were going to fire a shot. Good thing I went over when I did, I found them slumped over barely alive...I drug them down into the heading and got my buddy to help do what little we knew of CPR and mouth to mouth. We revived them. So I went back up and checked with my flame safety lamp (I don't think they even use those anymore)and it was barely burning due to low oxygen. After we got them up and outside they got sent to hospital and were ok. I went back up to see what what caused all this and found the air mover knocked over and blowing the wrong way

It's serious stuff. Good that they made it out OK.

[ccawgc]

The company I work for put every body through confined space training. even though we currently don't have any on site. only a few of us get near any when doing off site work.

[Munkul]

any level above 22% is classed as Oxygen enrichment. I don't understand the levels fully but have seen videos of violent and unexpected fires where the O2 level was even just "a few % higher".

the confined space training instructor we had a few years ago, told us early on in his career 30+ years ago when they used to supervise crude oil tank cleans... they would get an oxy-acetylene set over and blow oxygen into the tank for a minute or so to "sweeten the atmosphere" - absolute no-no! but none of them knew any better back then, and they certainly didn't have the simple gas monitors that we have now.
He considers himself extremely lucky that they didn't have an accident.

[tweake]

the other issue that arises is guys trying to rescue someone.
a ship at the local port lost 3 guys. 1st one to the fumes (off gassing from logs ), then the other two who rushed in to rescue him without breathing gear on.

[T man]

the other issue that arises is guys trying to rescue someone.
a ship at the local port lost 3 guys. 1st one to the fumes (off gassing from logs ), then the other two who rushed in to rescue him without breathing gear on.

My buddy is a trucker, and for a few years he worked as a honey dipper for a septic company.

There was a similar tragedy where a fella stuck his head into a tank, passed out, fell in the tank. Sons died as well, trying to save him.

https://www.nytimes.com/1994/07/25/n...-two-sons.html

Poor training, I would think? No?

Shouldn't you be made aware that these conditions could exist?

Complacency is a problem with most folks over a period of years, when nothing usually happens.


Or, like My neighbors son, who's friend died here:

https://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/20...trocution.html

Richard. An apprentice for the power company, was killed by a downed power line, and his bosses onsite didn't follow protocol and instruct him properly.

Neighbor said Richie was a really good kid that wasn't instructed properly where to stand or how to react around the live line. Since then, JCPL has instituted new processes and protocols for dealing with downed wires.. Too late for Richie