Eng/Nat The people of Charleston, West Virginia, have been given a frightening message on the tenth anniversary of the Bhopal chemical disaster in India -- it could happen to you too. Survivors of the Bhopal tragedy have travelled to the U.S. City to warn citizens to wake up to the potential for another disaster on their own doorstep. The people of Bhopal gather with the people of Charleston, West Virginia to remember. Their candles burn in memory of those who lost their lives - victims of a lethal gas - victims of a terrible industrial disaster. These Bhopal survivors saw death and destruction 10 years ago today, after the release of forty thousand pounds of methyl isocyanate gas from the Union Carbide plant. The memory of that day is all too real. SOUNDBITE: (Indian dialect) translation "She says, 'It's impossible to forget it, what it was like. Every time the third of December comes around they are reminded once again of what has happened, and it feels very close, it feels not at all distant, it feels like it was very recent.' And, obviously, she suffers." SUPER CAPTION: Rehana Begun Ri-hana Bi-goon, Bhopal resident Like the people of Bhopal, residents of Charleston face a similar danger. Only five miles away from this state-capitol city of two-hundred-thousand lies a sprawling chemical complex. Stretching for several miles, right up against communities and schools, the complex includes a plant operated by the French firm Rhone-Poulenc Rone-Poolank. Here, just a few minutes from downtown Charleston, the company produces the same gas, known as M-I-C, that hit Bhopal without warning. Rhone-Poulenc took over production of the gas after Union Carbide sold the operation. Used in pesticide production, M-I-C is produced and then transferred by high-pressure pipe to surrounding plants, or stored in huge underground tanks. Plant officials say they store up to 240- thousand pounds of M-I-C on any given day. That's triple the eighty-four thousand pounds stored at the Bhopal plant in 1984. Officials say Rhone-Poulenc is a safer place. SOUNDBITE: "Bhopal, as it happened in Bhopal, could never happen here. The operating standards are significantly different, the levels of technology are significantly different. We've gone far beyond the normal redundancy systems, and tried to add as many layers of protection as we possibly could." SUPER CAPTION: Phil Curry, Rhone-Poulenc plant spokesman But accidents do happen at Rhone-Poulenc. Like this explosion and fire in August 1993 which killed one worker and injured 19 others. SOUNDBITE: "Nobody new what to do. Everybody looked like to me like they just panicked, you know. Everybody was taking off running. I just kind of looked which way the wind was blowing....Well they ain't told us nothing. I kind of like to get out of here. They won't let us out of here. I want to go home." SUPER CAPTION: Rhone-Poulenc worker Investigators found that the blast had severely damaged a tank containing thirty- thousand pounds of M-I-C. The plant was fined one point three m dollars by the U-S government as a result of the blast - the largest in West Virginia history. Despite the near disaster, local safety officials say they are ready for the worst. SOUNDBITE: "Even with the catastrophic failure of a tank, with the emergency preparedness....things that we have going for us that they didn't have in Bhopal, India: our houses are better built, they're better sealed, there is more of a chance to shelter-in-place; we have automobiles so we can get away from it, things like that; computers to tell us where this stuff is going. No I don't think we could have a Bhopal. Do I think we could hurt a lot of people?, yeah, but not a Bhopal." SOUNDBITE: You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/1c8d58d6d52f43f19e6c782bf7d7fd77 Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork

• published: 23 Jul 2015
• views: 0