Gas cylinders pellet fall in from truck in a plastics production plant

In a plastics production plant, a pallet containing 7 cylinders of nitrogen and 1 cylinder of hydrogen fell from a truck traveling in a logistics zone.
The driver stopped the vehicle, cut off the engine and noticed a leak on the hydrogen cylinder; he warned his superintendent who alerted the firefighters, established a safety perimeter and interrupted any work with hot sources.

The firefighters stopped the leak by closing the cylinder valve and put the basket back on the truck which was then unloaded at the place originally planned.

The INITIATING cause was the fall of the load from the truck.

The analysis of he incident by the plant operator brought to these conclusions:
-the gas delivery rate was unusual high, and the gas cylinder pallets suitable for trolley transport were not available;
-the truck used as a replacement was not designed for the purpose and the load was not well secured;
-the acceleration of the driver at start-up would have resulted in the fall of the basket.
Therefore, the ROOT CAUSE was the decision to use inappropriate system to address increased frequency of the transport operations.

Trolley, gas cylinders pallet

This is a typical case of lack of safety culture, revealed by the wrong decision under delivery time pressure.

The operator prohibited the transport of baskets of gas cylinders other than by the dedicated trolleys and investigated a better way to secure the load (installation of side panels, anti-slip devices).