System Wrongfully Blamed in Union Carbide Leak : SAFER Fights Off Dark Cloud of Bad Publicity

A chemical leak this month at a West Virginia plant caused a scare, not only among hundreds of people caught in the fumes, but at a small Westlake Village company.

SAFER Emergency Systems is a 7-year-old company that builds computer systems to forecast the path toxic fumes will take when leaks occur at chemical plants. One of its tracking systems was briefly--and improperly, it turned out--blamed with breaking down when a Union Carbide plant spewed toxic methylene chloride and aldicarb oxime gases over a residential area Aug. 11 at Institute, W. Va.

The gas drifted without warning into several neighborhoods, sending 135 residents to hospitals with eye, throat and lung irritations.

The next day, Gary Gelinas, SAFER’S president, was irritated to learn that East Coast news reports were calling his fume-plotting system a flop.

Felt Effects of Publicity

But the gases that escaped were not among the three toxic chemicals--methyl isocyanate, chlorine and phosgene-- that officials at the West Virginia plant requested to be monitored by their computer when it was delivered four months ago.

Union Carbide officials confirmed that Aug. 13. But, by then, Gelinas’ company was feeling the effects of the bad publicity. Instead of emerging as the hero of the accidental spill by sounding an early warning about the fumes’ drift, SAFER’s system was being depicted as part of the cause of the mishap.

Gelinas said one large chemical company that had recently ordered a SAFER fume-forecasting system for one of its plants called to cancel when its executives read a newspaper account of the Union Carbide leak that said residents were engulfed “despite an elaborate new warning system.”

“I explained that our system wasn’t programmed for the chemical that leaked. I explained that the forecasts that were given were given for a different chemical. I explained the old saying, ‘garbage in, garbage out,’ ” said the 38-year-old Gelinas.

‘They Were Concerned’

“Other customers called and asked if they should place the orders with us that they’d planned on. They were concerned about what they heard.”

Gelinas hurriedly sent out a statement to chemical companies that have already purchased about 50 of his computer systems. He assured them that a full report on the Union Carbide incident will be forwarded to them when all of the facts are known.

In the meantime, Union Carbide officials acknowledged their failure to include methylene chloride or aldicarb oxime in their computer’s initial program. They announced plans to have additional chemicals quickly added.

Thad Epps, a Union Carbide spokesman, said company scientists will decide which chemicals pose “the most potential risk” at the Institute plant in determining new entries into the SAFER system. “With the publicity that aldicarb oxime and methylene chloride have received, they probably will be included whether they need to be or not,” he said.

Carbide ‘Very Satisfied’

Epps said Union Carbide officials “so far have been very satisfied” with the SAFER computer, although it hasn’t been used in any other emergency.

Gelinas said the basic $80,000 cost of the SAFER computer system includes programming of the system to monitor 10 chemicals. Each additional chemical program costs about $500. There is capacity for 50 chemicals in the 32-byte Motorola super-microcomputer that the system uses.

The computer is connected to weather instruments that allow it to calculate the direction and speed of gas fumes when plant operators or special sensors detect a leak. The fume-drift forecasts are shown on a map on a color video monitor or on computer printouts.

“They are sending us the data for the additional chemicals and hopefully it should be on line in the next few weeks,” Gelinas said.

Says Truth Saved Business

“I think we’ve overcome the bad public relations we got. But, had the truth not come out, we probably would have been out of business,” he said.

Before the incident, Gelinas had predicted his company’s work force would triple this year to about 21 because of chemical-industry nervousness over the chemical leak that killed about 2,000 people in Bhopal, India. He said he expects 1986 sales of about $5 million, about 2 1/2 times the company’s expected 1985 gross.

The privately held company does not disclose its profits.