By IANS,
Raipur : Bhilai Steel Plant, a key unit of the public sector Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL), is expected to resume production by late Tuesday, a company statement said.
Fire broke out early Monday at the plant in Chhattisgarh, severely hitting hot metal production.
“The production process is expected to gradually resume by end of the day,” the statement said.
The unit that had seen a record production in fiscal year 2008-09 with 5.4 million tonnes of hot metal, is based in Chhattisgarh’s Durg district, some 30 km west of state capital Raipur.
Production of hot metal in the unit was hit after a fire broke out in the cable tunnel of its Power and Blowing Station (P and BS) between 1 a.m. and 2 a.m.
The P and BS supplies compressed air to the steel plant’s blast furnaces which produce hot metal. The plant produces 17,000 tonnes of hot metal daily on an average.
“The cable relaying work in Power Plant 1 is in full swing to restore normalcy. It is expected that after the cables are laid and connections are established, the first unit of Power Plant will start functioning. Once the Turbine blowers start supplying blast (compressed air) to Blast Furnaces, the furnaces will normalise gradually,” the statement said.