Lessons From Longford: The Esso Gas Plant Explosion

Home >
Human Resources >
Health & Safety >
Lessons From Longford: The Esso Gas Plant Explosion

Description
Contents
Author

Details

Written by leading author Professor Andrew Hopkins, this book is a "must read" for all organisations which have a duty of care to their employees under the Occupational Health and Safety legislation.

Written by an expert witness at the Royal Commission hearing into the Esso gas plant explosion at Longford in 1998.

Applies legal concepts to a real-life scenario in a practical way.

Should be read by company executives and occupational health and safety professionals, as well as students of management, policy makers and anyone interested in risk management and disaster studies.
Contents Includes:

Lessons from Longford examines the findings of the Royal Commission into the Esso gas plant explosion at Longford, Victoria, in September 1998. It is written by an expert witness at the Commission hearings. Two men were killed in the Longford accident, which ripped through the Esso plant with devastating consequences. Melbourne’s gas supply was cut off for two weeks, causing disruption on a wide scale.

Written is a clear and concise style, Lessons from Longford explains why the Royal Commission decided that it was inappropriate to blame the plant operators and that the accident was really Esso’s fault.
Dr Andrew Hopkins is Associate Professor of Sociology at the Australian National University in Canberra. He is the author of numerous articles on the management and regulation of occupational health and safety, as well as several books, including:
- Making Safety Work: Getting Management Commitment to Occupational Health and Safety, Sydney: Allen and Unwin, 1995
- Managing Major Hazards: the Lessons of the Moura Mine Disaster, Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1999
Dr Hopkins was an expert witness at the Royal Commission into the causes of the fire at Esso’s gas plant at Longford in Victoria in 1998. He was an expert member of the Board of Inquiry into the exposure of F111 maintenance workers to toxic chemicals at Amberley Air Force base. He currently teaches courses on criminology and the sociology of disasters. He has a BSc and an MA from the ANU and a PhD from the University of Connecticut.