Nitrogen in Air Supply Felled Nassco Painters, Company Says

Twenty National Steel and Shipbuilding Co. spray-painters became ill after someone accidentally connected their air supply to a cargo ship firefighting system that contained excess nitrogen, company officials concluded Saturday.

The spray-painters, working on and below the helicopter deck of the cargo ship, were rushed to area hospitals Friday afternoon after several of them vomited and passed out from breathing the air supplied through gas masks.

Three workers were hospitalized overnight, but all were released by Saturday afternoon, said Fred Hallett, Nassco vice president for finance and public relations.

Although some company officials had suspected toxic gases were the problem, Hallett said company tests showed no “gases other than those that are normal in air.” The samples were sent to an independent laboratory, and results of a second round of testing will be available Monday, he said.

Meanwhile, officials discovered that someone had hooked up the air supply for the painters--hoses connected to a common supply of compressed air--to the ship’s firefighting system, which uses a series of pipes to transport inert gases to smother fires throughout the ship.

The company had just completed tests on the firefighting system by pumping nitrogen through the pipes at 1:30 p.m. Apparently, a worker made the bad connection and the excess nitrogen funneled into the workers’ air supply, triggering the breathing problems because there was not enough oxygen, said Hallett.

“We suspect that it was an inadvertent hook-up,” Hallett said.

“We will start Monday to do a complete review to find out exactly what happened and what steps or procedures we have to take in the future to make sure we do not have a reoccurence.” Until then, he said, all nitrogen testing will be suspended.

The men were working on the Maj. Stephen W. Pless, a cargo ship being converted for use by the military. Spray-painting will resume Monday, said Hallett, but it was not clear whether the men hospitalized Friday would be back at work.