Bayer engaged in campaign of secrecy, committee says
April 21, 2009 ·
A congressional committee report says Bayer CropScience withheld information from emergency responders after a deadly explosion at a West Virginia chemical plant last summer.
The staff report by the House Energy and Commerce Committee says that its investigation revealed that Bayer CropScience "engaged in a campaign of secrecy." The explosion at the Bayer CropScience plant in Institute killed two people.
The report says the explosion came close to compromising a tank holding methyl isocyanate, or MIC. The same chemical was responsible for the deaths of thousands in Bhopal, India, when it leaked from a former Union Carbide plant in 1984.
The staff report says that had a projectile hit that tank, the consequences "could have eclipsed" the 1984 disaster.