The boiler involved in injuring an employee Sunday at NPU’s wastewater treatment plant will be taken offline permanently. In addition, operations at Norwich Public Utilities’ (NPU) wastewater treatment plant have not been affected by the boiler incident.
Chris Riley, communications and community outreach manager for NPU, said the building where the boiler is located will be taken down within the next 6-12 months as part of NPU’s project to modernize the wastewater treatment plant.
“Out of an abundance of caution, we will not repair or use this boiler again regardless of the results of our investigation,” Riley said.
New updates were released Monday afternoon regarding the NPU employee injured from a boiler at NPU’s wastewater treatment plant Sunday.
Riley said the employee suffered non-life-threatening injuries from the incident and was able to leave Backus Hospital Sunday afternoon.
“We are very optimistic that he will make a full recovery before too long,” Riley said Monday afternoon.
The investigation into the incident’s cause is underway. Riley said there was a meeting at the wastewater treatment plant Monday morning, which was attended by NPU, their safety consultant, the Connecticut Department of Labor’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health as well as the State of Connecticut’s Boiler Inspector.
NPU, Norwich Police and Norwich Fire Departments responded to an NPU employee injured from an incident involving a boiler at NPU’s wastewater treatment plant Sunday.
According to Riley, NPU is conducting its own investigation of the incident, which will include an audit of all the equipment that was involved and conversations with NPU employees, the boiler’s manufacturer and any contractors who have provided maintenance on the boiler.
The exact cause of the incident was not known as of Monday afternoon.
“It is possible that there was some type of equipment failure or malfunction within or adjacent to the boiler that caused Sunday’s incident,” Riley said.
This article originally appeared on The Bulletin: Norwich Public Utilities boiler accident update