Sascha Wil­son

Se­nior re­porter

sascha.wil­son@guardian.co.tt

The fam­i­ly of Al­lan­lane Ramkissoon, who died af­ter suf­fer­ing burns in an in­ci­dent at the Ni­Quan Pointe-a-Pierre plant, is re­lieved a pro­hi­bi­tion no­tice was served on the com­pa­ny.

“I be­lieve it is a good move be­cause it could hap­pen to some­body again. This way, they could make sure it is safe for oth­ers to work. We don’t want an­oth­er tragedy,” Ramkissoon’s younger sis­ter, Ruth­lane Ramkissoon-Gob­in, said yes­ter­day.

In a re­lease yes­ter­day, the Oc­cu­pa­tion­al Safe­ty & Health Agency stat­ed that a pro­hi­bi­tion no­tice had been served on Ni­Quan En­er­gy Trinidad Ltd.

Ac­cord­ing to the OSH Act, a pro­hi­bi­tion no­tice pro­hibits ac­tiv­i­ty im­me­di­ate­ly or af­ter a spec­i­fied pe­ri­od and does not al­low it to be re­sumed un­til re­me­di­al ac­tion has been tak­en.

Re­spond­ing to me­dia re­ports on rel­a­tives in­quir­ing about OS­HA’s re­sponse to the in­ci­dent, the agency stat­ed that they had re­ceived a re­port on the ac­ci­dent on June 16 at 11.10 am.

“The In­spec­tors im­me­di­ate­ly re­spond­ed to the re­port and have al­ready launched an in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the ac­ci­dent in the con­text of the du­ties and re­quire­ments of the Oc­cu­pa­tion­al Safe­ty and Health Act Chap­ter 88:08 and to seek to de­ter­mine the cause,” the re­lease stat­ed.

In a tele­phone in­ter­view, how­ev­er, Ramkissoon-Gob­in lament­ed that the re­port sub­mit­ted to the min­istry should have been dis­closed to them be­cause they are still in the dark about the cir­cum­stances sur­round­ing the in­ci­dent that claimed her broth­er’s life.

Ramkissoon, a pip­efit­ter at Massy En­er­gy En­gi­neered So­lu­tions Lim­it­ed, suf­fered burns to 60 per cent of his body dur­ing an ac­ci­dent flash fire at the plant on June 15.

Ramkissoon, 35, a fa­ther of two, was flown to a Spe­cial­ist Burns Unit in Colom­bia for treat­ment but he passed away on Sun­day.

This is the sec­ond ma­jor in­ci­dent that has re­sult­ed in op­er­a­tions at the Ni­Quan plant be­ing sus­pend­ed.

Fol­low­ing an ex­plo­sion in April 2021, the plant op­er­a­tions stalled but recom­menced in May 28, 2022.

Pointe-a-Pierre MP and shad­ow min­is­ter for en­er­gy David Lee has re­peat­ed­ly called for the find­ings of the re­port in­to the 2021 in­ci­dent to be made pub­lic.

Dur­ing a me­dia con­fer­ence yes­ter­day, En­er­gy Min­is­ter Stu­art Young yes­ter­day said he was seek­ing le­gal ad­vice on whether Gov­ern­ment could make the re­port on 2021 blast pub­lic.

Speak­ing on be­half of her fam­i­ly yes­ter­day, Ramkissoon-Gob­in said they were pleased that the lat­est in­ci­dent was be­ing tak­en se­ri­ous­ly, but not­ed the re­port was not shared with them.

“We are re­lieved but dis­ap­point­ed,” she said.

She is hope­ful that the con­tents of the in­ci­dent re­port and the in­ves­ti­ga­tion will be shared with them. Mean­while, she said her broth­er’s wife was still in Colom­bia and they are un­sure when his body will be brought home.

The En­er­gy Cham­ber of Trinidad and To­ba­go, in re­lease yes­ter­day, called for a de­tailed, ex­pe­di­tious in­ves­ti­ga­tion and time­ly shar­ing of the find­ings of the min­istry’s in­ves­ti­ga­tion in­to the cir­cum­stances that led to Ramkissoon’s death.