Recovery still on going of contract workers' bodies

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GEORGETOWN – Crews continue to work to recover the bodies of trapped workers who died inside a pipe near Guanella Pass Tuesday.

The Clear Creek County Undersherriff Stu Nay held a press conference Wednesday morning, saying that the investigation into the workers' deaths and the fire will continue Wednesday morning.

Nay says once the bodies are recovered, they will be turned over to the Clear Creek County Coroner's Office so they can be identified.

The accident killed five workers inside a pipe under a dam on Guanella Pass Tuesday night and various organizations will assist in the investigation. They include the Clear Creek County Sheriff's Office, OSHA, Colorado Bureau of Investigations, Clear Creek County Coroner's Office, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

OSHA will also investigate to see if the companies involved violated any OSHA regulations, according to Herb Gibson, President of the CO OSHA.

The workers were trapped after an underground fire broke out in a pipe at the Cabin Creek Station hydroelectric plan operated by Xcel Energy.

Gibson said one investigator was at the site Tuesday night and three more investigators joined the investigation Wednesday morning.

They will be interviewing Xcel management, rescue workers, employees and investigate how the chemical materials were applied, the ventilation and reviewing autopsy and coroner's reports, according to Gibson.

OSHA has finded and cited RPI Coating several times in the past. Click here to read the complete story.

Additionally, the Chemical Safety Board will send a representative to the site to investigate the circumstances behind the accident.

The CSB is an independent federal agency that investigates industrial chemical accidents.

Nay also went through a timeline of events which appears to be slightly different than information originally released Tuesday evening.

Between 2 and 2:10 p.m. a report of a fire at the hydroelectric plant was received.

Xcel Energy says the fire broke out at the Cabin Creek hydroelectric facility, five miles south of Georgetown. The fire was about 3,000 feet from the dam structure.

Xcel says the fire started in an underground penstock while the plant was shut down for routine maintenance. A penstock is basically a massive water pipe. This penstock is used to take water to the turbines.

Xcel says a crew of nine contractors from RPI Coating were working inside the pipe, which is 12 feet in diameter, and coating it with an epoxy solution to keep it from corroding. According to Xcel, there was a problem with a piece of equipment and a fire started. Xcel added, during Wednesday's press conference, that the contractors had been working on the project since September 4 and weren't scheduled to finish until November.

Four members of the crew were below the fire when it started and they were able to escape. Two were treated for chemical inhalation and released from an area hospital.

The other five people made radio communication at 2:30 p.m., roughly 20 minutes after the first fire report was received. At that time there were no reports of injuries.

The contractors were able to climb above the pipe and get above a temporary block that was put there to keep the water from where they were working. Those five people were 2,000 feet into the pipe and 1,000 feet from where the fire began. They could not go up, because of the angle of the pipe, and could not go down because of the fire.

Xcel says rescuers lowered down oxygen around 45 minutes after the fire started, but it is unclear if the contractors were able to reach the supplies.

At 4 p.m., nearly an hour-and-a-half after the last radio communication, crews entered the lower end to survey the situation. At 4:30 p.m. they reported 15 feet of visibility and about an hour later they reported open visibility.

At 5:40 p.m. the Henderson Mine Rescue Crew entered the lower end of the pipe. At the same time the Urban Search and Rescue Crew and Alpine Team attempted to be dropped down through the top entrance but soon decided that entering from the bottom with clear visibility would improve their rescue attempt.

Crews from across the Front Range were called to respond to the fire. It was reported as extinguished by crews at 6:30 p.m.

"Once they made sure we had plenty of air inside that were OK for the rescuers, we sent people in and were able to locate the bodies of the trapped," said Clear Creek County Undersheriff Stu Nay.

Nay says the bodies were found around 8 p.m., "fairly deep underground." During Wednesday's press conference he said three paramedics reported that the bodies had no vitals. It was roughly six hours between the last radio communication and the location of the dead bodies.

Crews did not work overnight to pull the bodies but instead regrouped Wednesday morning and decided to investigate the two issues separately.

"Our goal was to get the bodies removed today, but we still have to document both scenes. We're going to split the scene into two separate investigations. One will be to determine the cause and origin of the fire, and the other one will be processing the scene around where the victims were found," said Nay.

The Colorado Bureau of Investigation will help deputies determine what happened and the coroner's office will determine the contractors' identities and notify next of kin after they are pulled from the pipe.

Another crew, including representatives from Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, will work to determine the cause of the fire. They expect to have official results next week.

During a late-night news conference Tuesday, Tim Taylor, president and CEO of Public Service of Colorado, an Xcel Energy company, expressed his sympathy to the families of the victims.

"On behalf of Xcel, we want to express our deepest sympathy tonight to the families, friends, and co-workers of the contractors that was involved in this situation," Taylor said. "We're deeply saddened to hear of their deaths and our sympathies go out with the families. That's where our thoughts should be."

"Regarding the investigation, we are absolutely going to keep the lines of communications open between Xcel and the agencies working on this investigation and we'll be working closely with the authorities as it proceeds," said Taylor.

Guanella Pass was closed at Georgetown because of the fire.