Accident Occurs at J.E. Berkowitz Plant; No Injuries Reported
September 13, 2012

by Penny Stacey, pstacey@glass.com

Pedricktown, N.J.-based J.E. Berkowitz announced yesterday that an accident occurred late Tuesday night with one of the company's three tempering ovens, "which, at that time, was being repaired/serviced by the oven manufacturer's technician," according to a statement from company president Arthur Berkowitz.

The incident is believe to have been caused by a gas explosion.

"We were extremely fortunate that there were no personal injuries," he says, "and, no other ancillary damage to any other equipment, products, power sources, etc."

Berkowitz says the company's staff reacted quickly, and is working to ensure capacity is not affected.

"Our management team has already met [yesterday] morning to develop a recovery plan and, given our resources and our team's commitment, I am confident that it will have minimal impact in our ability to meet our customer's needs for heat?treated products," he says. "We are fortunate to have the redundancy of two other operating furnaces to handle the demand for heat-treated products and plans on how to expand their capacity are in progress."