Ammonia leak at meatworks

Five South Pacific Meats employees were taken to Southland Hospital after an ammonia leak at the Awarua plant yesterday morning.

A Labour Department spokesperson said yesterday that it was making inquiries into two ammonia leaks at South Pacific Meats – one on Wednesday and the second yesterday morning.

Plant manager Kevin Hamilton said it was the same leak that had given off the smell, alerting staff on both occasions.

It had taken them until yesterday morning to isolate the smell to the plant’s chiller.

A corroded pipe seeping, he said.

The employees were taken to

had

been Southland Hospital yesterday morning in vans from the plant after they smelt fumes from a leaking pipe in the chiller, where the smell had been isolated.

Parts of the plant had been closed down since Wednesday while the smell was tracked.

The cause – found at 9.15am yesterday – was a section of pipe which had since been replaced, he said.

The employees who had entered the area had been taken to the hospital as a precaution and had been discharged immediately, Mr Hamilton said.

This week’s pipe seepage is the latest in a string of incidents at the plant.

The Labour Department has begun an investigation after a bandsaw operator’s arm was nearly severed at the elbow earlier this month, and Environment Southland is also investigating the cause of an effluent spill from the plant on February 2.

The company has also been fined $30,000 for blocking union representatives from its Awarua plant.

The firm was ordered by the Employment Relations Authority to pay $20,000 in compensation to seasonal worker Melissa Mackie after she was not rehired for another season. Ms Mackie is the partner of Henry Kingi, a plant employee who lost part of his thumb on the main saw at the plant in 2010 and who also has a case against the plant.

The spokesperson for the Labour Department said there were no plans to close South Pacific Meats.