Major chemical incident in the Jebel Ali Port in late June 2008 that originally involved two 20’ containers full of 68% concentration Nitric Acid (Primary Class - 8 Corrosive; Subsidiary Risk - 5.1 Oxidizer). The recommended packaging for this substance from the International Chemical Safety Card (UN, ILO, WHO, EU - 2006) is “Unbreakable packaging: put breakable packaging into closed unbreakable container.” Upon opening the container, it was found that the cargo was packaged in 25 L drums that were stacked inside wooden crates.

Though originally called to respond to one container, examination of the shipment's documentation revealed four additional containers containing nitric acid in the same inadequate packaging.

Staff stood down during the high day-time temperatures after working throughout the first night to isolate, re-locate, and open the first two containers.

We were called late in the afternoon on day two when the second container spontaneously caught fire. We provided incident management advice to the local fire fighters and supported operations to extinguish the fire. Once the fire was finally extinguished, we continued operations to render the area safe.

The other three containers in the shipment were identified and transported to the work area where we commenced unstuffing the cargo and transferring it into appropriate packaging. The primary objective of the response was to pump the acid from the original 25 L drums into 200 L HDPE barrels that were rated to hold the cargo.

The cargo’s original packaging continued to deteriorate throughout all response activities resulting in significant quantities of free nitric acid which posed additional risks to the public and other users of this area. Throughout the operations, we continued to neutralize all contaminated areas to ensure a safe working environment. The final container of the shipment also caught fire approximately two weeks after operations commenced. We also supported the response effort for bringing this situation under control.

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