Contract staff dies inside ship at Chennai port, another serious

The deceased, Ramasamy of Virudhunagar, and Jegan of Tiruvallur were staff of a contractor at the Chennai Port. The contractor was assigned the job of spraying pesticide in the ship that was half filled with corn brought from neighbouring districts while the remaining corn is expected to arrive in the coming days.

Ramasamy and Jegan were checking the pipes used to spray the pesticide, ethylenebromide, when the incident happened.

“The staff is supposed to spray the pesticide after it is fully loaded. When they went to inspect the pipes, both of them collapsed. They were rushed out of the ship, but Ramasamy was declared dead. Jegan has been admitted to a private hospital where he is undergoing treatment at the intensive care unit,” said the police.

Harbour police said that preliminary post-mortem report suggested that they could have died of oxygen deficiency, and added that a case has been registered under Section 304A (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) of IPC against the contractor’s manager Praveen and supervisor Moses.