Workers noticed ‘rotten egg’ smell before deadly US chocolate factory blast
Workers at a Pennsylvania chocolate factory smelled "rotten eggs" before a powerful natural gas explosion that levelled one building, heavily damaged another and killed seven people, US federal safety officials said on Tuesday in a preliminary report.
The National Transportation Safety Board's five-paragraph account of the fatal explosion confirmed earlier reporting by The Associated Press and other media outlets that employees had detected an odour of natural gas at the R.M. Palmer Co. factory in West Reading, a small town 96 kilometres north-west of Philadelphia.
About 70 Palmer production workers and 35 office staff were working in two adjacent buildings at the time of the March 24 blast, according to the agency's report, and employees in both buildings told federal investig...
