Roof collapse at closed steel mill injures nine, three critically
Accident took place at the Sparrows Point tinplate mill, closed in 2012.
Above: Old Cold Strip Mill at former Bethlehem Steel plant at Sparrows Point, after the roof collapsed injuring nine demolition workers.
The roof of a building at the closed steel mill at Sparrows Point collapsed on workers doing demolition there today, injuring nine people, three of them critically, Baltimore County Fire Department officials said.
The workers “were in the area of the old tin mill doing demolition work on the old cold strip mill,” according to a release from Baltimore County Police and Fire.
The collapse occurred while workers helping to demolish the structure were inside of the building. The release noted that “early reports said that five workers were injured, but the final count is nine.”
Four of the workers were transported to the R Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center at the University of Maryland Medical Center with fair to critical injuries. The other five patients were transported with minor injuries to other local hospitals.
At 10:01 a.m., county fire officials received a call reporting a building collapse at the Sparrows Point plant, at 1577 Sparrows Point Road.
The cause of the collapse is under investigation by Maryland Occupational Safety and Health, which had personnel on the scene.
25 Pieces of Apparatus on Scene
Approximately 65 responders from the Baltimore County Fire Department were at the scene, along with 25 pieces of apparatus. Seven medic units, along with two helicopters from the Maryland State Police, were used to treat and transport the injured.
At last check with the Cowley Shock Trauma Center, two of the patients remained in critical condition, “one in serious and one in fair,” the release said.
The mill, once the region’s economic engine, officially shut down in August 2012, though its fate was sealed months earlier, as The Brew reported in detail.
The 2,500-acre site was acquired by two Midwest liquidators, Hilco Trading and Environmental Liability Transfer, who are in the process of scrapping the mill.
For those who would like to understand why the world’s once-largest steel facility, just outside Baltimore, went out of business, read Mark Reutter’s Six Reasons Why the Sparrows Point Steel Mill Collapsed.