‘Their skin was peeling off from the chemical burns’: Andhra reactor blast that killed 15 leaves trail of broken homes

Anakapalle District Collector Vijaya Krishnan confirmed the toll. While the bodies of seven were found initially, it took rescuers hours to get to the seven other victims.

L Srinivas Rao, a Mandal Parishad Territorial Constituency member, representing the SEZ Colony, Rambilli, told The Indian Express, “The victims are from various areas of the 23 panchayats in the Rambili mandal, Vizianagaram, Kakinada, and Visakhapatnam. The workers who died or were injured do the most crucial and dangerous jobs. Mohan’s parents, for instance, are daily wage workers, and he was the first to go out of the village to make a living. He was earning about Rs 14,000 per month as a painter and an equipment operator. I used to meet him over the weekends,” Rao said.

Similarly, Harika hailed from Kakinada and belonged to a low-income family, her co-workers said. She, like Mohan, was working as an “operator” at the pharma unit.

“If she was on the afternoon shift, she would sometimes travel three hours to her home in Kakinada to be with her family for a few hours and return to work the next day. She was a hard worker with big dreams,” her coworker G Musalrao said. “Mohan had been working at the company for a year. He worked right next to the reactor room. Most of the workers who operate the reactors, gas pipelines, and equipment with chemicals get little pay, but it is important for their families.”

The District Collector told The Indian Express that the incident occurred around 2:15 pm. “The factory operates with 381 employees in two shifts, and the reactor blast occurred during lunch time, due to which employees’ presence was less. At least 37 members are affected in the fire accident as per initial information.”

The company manufactures intermediate chemicals and APIs ( active pharmaceutical ingredients). It started production in April 2019 with an investment of Rs 200 crore. The campus is spread over 40 acres.

Circle inspector of Atchutapuram police station, M Buchaiah, described horrific scenes as several persons who suffered extensive chemical burns had their skins peeling off while being shifted into ambulances. “It was horrible, heartbreaking. They were screaming before they lost consciousness,” he said.

Officials said that after the blast, the area was filled with thick smoke, hampering rescue operations. The reason for the explosion will be clear at a later stage. “Many people from the Rambilli mandal work in that company. Neither company authorities nor the police are able to give clarity,” said G Ramanamma, the sarpanch of Rambili village.

Home Minister V Anitha directed the district administration to ensure that the injured receive the best treatment.

YSRCP leader and former chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy expressed shock over the incident and urged the government to take steps to prevent such incidents from recurring.

This is the fourth explosion in the Atchutapuram SEZ. On July 17, an explosion killed a 44-year-old migrant worker from Odisha, after a blast at a pharma and speciality chemicals company. In February last year, a reactor blast at another such firm killed one worker while three people were seriously injured. In June 2023, two persons died in an explosion at a pharma firm in the same SEZ.