Dust levels at sawmills across B.C. are under scrutiny after two explosions in a span of three months left four men dead.
The exact causes of Monday's blaze at Lakelands Sawmill in Prince George and the January blast in Burns Lake are unknown, but some are speculating that processing older wood killed by the mountain pine beetle could be creating finer, more combustible dust.
"We suspect, when you have catastrophic explosions like this that we've never had before, that something's different," Steve Hunt of the United Steelworkers union told reporters.
About 70 per cent of the wood milled at Lakeland was killed by pine beetle. John Allan of the Council of Forest Industries said that trees killed by pine beetles have often been dead for longer periods of time than other logged trees.
"They're drier, they're more brittle, there are cracks in them," he said.
Inspection reports showed concerns over dust levels in Burns Lake, and dust is mentioned twice in five years' worth of Lakelands inspection reports released Wednesday by WorkSafe BC.
A 2009 report refers specifically to pine beetle wood and reads, "no recent monitoring of exposure to wood dust has been conducted. Wood dust exposure will be further evaluated."
And in February, after a small fire, an inspector noted: "There are accumulations of piles of wood dust in various areas of the mill. We reviewed to requirement to prevent the accumulation of hazardous amounts of wood dust."
No orders were issued against the mill in relation to dust. The company that owns the mill says that it increased the size of the cleanup crew and reviewed its protocol on debris buildup in response to the reports.
Union representatives, people from the industry and WorkSafe BC officials are meeting this week to discuss best practices to keep millworkers safe from the effects of dust.
With a report from CTV British Columbia's Mi-Jung Lee
