Tuas fatal blast: Firm fined $500k, man jailed more than 18 months over 2021 tragedy that killed 3

SINGAPORE - A company involved in the installation of fire protection systems and its director were dealt with on June 25 over a fatal blast at a Tuas worksite in 2021.

The explosion at Tuas Avenue 11 on Feb 24, 2021, killed three workers and injured seven others.

The company, Stars Engrg, was fined $500,000, while its sole director, Chua Xing Da, 42, who oversaw the worksite’s operations, was given 18 months and a week’s jail.

In sentencing, District Judge Tan Jen Tse said the breaches relating to the operation of the mixer machine had occurred over a substantial period of time.

He added that Stars had ample time to correct these breaches.

As the director of Stars, Chua had sole and complete control of how the mixer was operated, and had wrongly instructed the workers on how to use the machine.

Chua and Stars were on May 26 convicted of two charges under the Workplace Safety and Health Act over safety lapses, after a 21-day trial.

He and the company failed to ensure the mixer machine was safe to use.

They also failed to ensure their employees had received adequate training and supervision to operate the equipment.

These safety lapses led to a blast which killed three employees – Bangladeshis Shohel Md, 23, and Anisuzzaman Md, 29, and Indian national Subbaiyan Marimuthu, 38.

They died from severe burns which covered 90 per cent of their bodies.

Stars’ production manager, Myanmar national Lwin Moe Tun, 36, was convicted on two counts of obstruction of justice for deleting messages between himself and Subbaiyan.

He was given six weeks’ jail.

Chua was convicted of instigating him to delete the messages.

During earlier proceedings, the DPPs said Chua and Lwin oversaw the production of fire-retardant wraps at the worksite.

These wraps comprised an aluminium sheet exterior and were made of various layers, including a clay-like lining that Stars called “fire clay”.

The fire clay was manufactured at the worksite using a mixer machine that Stars purchased in August 2019. It was installed at the worksite in June 2020.

The mixer machine had an oil jacket meant to contain “heat transfer fluid” and transfer heat from built-in heaters to the contents of the machine’s mixing chamber.

The machine came with two resistance temperature detectors (RTDs).

Under Chua’s direction, the mixer machine was operated with insufficient oil, causing overheating and over-pressure within its oil jacket.

The RTDs were also not used properly, with no proper temperature control or monitoring within the oil jacket.

This resulted in the jacket rupturing, leading to the release of pressurised oil out of it and forming a liquid aerosol that was ignited, resulting in the explosion.

Prosecutors said Chua knew the mixer machine was unsafe for use, after several “red flag” incidents, including a fire occurring near a drain valve at the bottom of the oil jacket.

Prosecutors said instead of investigating, Chua ignored the red flags, which led to the unsafe operation of the mixer machine.

During the trial, Chua said he did not think the incidents such as the fire and the leakage were red flags.

After the explosion, Chua knew that Lwin Moe Tun had Subbaiyan’s phone.

The phone contained messages between Lwin Moe Tun and Subbaiyan about the unsafe changing of a faulty heater on the device.

Chua told Lwin Moe Tun it was “ok” to delete these messages from the Myanmar national’s phone.

Lwin Moe Tun admitted he had deleted messages from his phone and from Subbaiyan’s as he did not want to be involved in the investigations.

Deputy Public Prosecutors Timotheus Koh, Grace Chua and Mohamed Riasudeen sought a fine of between $600,000 and $800,000 for Stars, and a jail term of 20 to 24 months and two to four weeks’ jail for Chua.

They said Stars’ conduct resulted in multiple deaths, serious injuries and serious property damage, all of which could have been prevented if Stars and Chua had taken the operation of the machine more seriously.

They said: “Stars committed multiple serious failures in not taking reasonably practicable steps to ensure that the mixer machine was safe for use and that its employees operated the mixer machine in a safe environment.”

This included how Stars had operated the mixer machine with insufficient heating oil, incorrectly used it as a closed system, failed to monitor the oil jacket temperature, made inappropriate modifications on the mixer machine and ignored the ‘red flag’ incidents regarding the mixer machine.

They added that as Chua was the sole director of Stars, he was the person who was responsible for its unsafe work practices, as he made all the critical decisions that led to the company’s failures.

On his obstruction of justice charge, the DPPs noted that Chua only informed the police about the deleted messaged in April 2021, close to two months after the deletion.

For Lwin Moe Tun, the DPPs asked for a jail term of six to eight weeks.

Chua and Lwin Moe Tun will begin serving their sentences on July 23.