rss
Occup Environ Med 1999;56:649-656 doi:10.1136/oem.56.10.649

Analysis of a petrol plume over England: 18-19 January 1997.

  1. F Welch,
  2. V S Murray,
  3. A G Robins,
  4. R G Derwent,
  5. D B Ryall,
  6. M L Williams,
  7. A J Elliott
  1. Chemical Incident Response Service, Guy's and St Thomas' Hospital Trust, London, UK.

      Abstract

      OBJECTIVES: About 7000 tonnes of unleaded petrol were discharged into the English Channel after a tanker collision off Ostend on Saturday 18 January 1997. The petrol evaporated and the vapour plume was carried across the central part of England to Wales, resulting in reports of unidentified odours, and irritation of the eyes, skin, and upper respiratory tract. This work uses this incident to show how marine and atmospheric dispersion modelling together with routine air quality monitoring can assist in identifying hazards to the population at risk from chemical incidents. METHODS: Public health surveillance and results from environmental sampling were compared with the behaviour of the plume as predicted by computer modelling. RESULTS: The predicted plume path and dispersion were shown to correlate well with the results from surveillance and environmental analysis. CONCLUSIONS: There is a need for public health professionals to interact with medical toxicologists, atmospheric and marine scientists and engineers, and other environmental experts in managing events of this nature.

      This Article

      1. Abstract
      2. PDF

      Services

      1. Email this link to a friend
      2. Alert me when this article is cited
      3. Alert me if a correction is posted
      4. Alert me when eletters are published
      5. Article Usage Statistics
      6. Similar articles in this journal
      7. Similar articles in Web of Science
      8. Similar articles in PubMed
      9. Add article to my folders
      10. Download to citation manager
      11. Request permissions

      Responses

      1. Submit a response
      2. No responses published

      Social bookmarking

      Register for free content


      Free sample
       This recent issue is free to all users to allow everyone the opportunity to see the full scope and typical content of OEM.
      View free sample issue >>

      Free archive
      The full back archive is now available for OEM. Institutional subscribers may access the entire archive as part of their subscription. Personal subscribers will also have access to all content when logged in. Non-subscribers who register have free access to all articles published before 2006, back to volume 1 issue 1.
      Register to access the free archive >>

      Don't forget to sign up for content alerts so you keep up to date with all the articles as they are published.