Rescuers worked Tuesday to free five workers trapped more than 1,000 feet below ground at a Colorado hydroelectric power plant following a chemical fire.

"They're alive and they're talking," Kathleen Baubatz, spokeswoman for Clear Creek County Office of Emergency Response, told The Denver Post. "They're being rescued."

Four other workers doing routine maintenance duties in the same area at Excel Energy's Cabin Creek Hydro plant escaped, the newspaper said. Two of them were treated for chemical inhalation.

The fire reportedly started when the workers were coating a four-foot diameter water pipeline with epoxy paint to prevent corrosion when the equipment malfunctioned and started a fire about 2 p.m., said Ethnie Groves, spokeswoman for Xcel Energy.

The five trapped workers were able to get beyond a barrier that blocks groundwater from seeping up the pipeline and communicated with rescuers by radio. The fire had not been extinguished but steps were taken to get them fresh air, the newspaper reported. 
 // Copyright 2007 by United Press International


Publication date: 03 October 2007   

Source:

Archive