Turkey steel plant blast in Aliaga kills 18 workers; owner's chairman detained

The first reports from the governor's office were of three dead and 14 injured, revised to six dead and then 10. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said after a Monday cabinet meeting that 16 had been killed and pledged to establish who was responsible. Health Minister Kemal Memisoglu later announced the 17th death. Deputy Justice Minister Can Tuncay told reporters that the victims died of severe burns. All the dead and injured were plant workers.

Habas said the explosion happened during scheduled maintenance and that its safety management system is inspected regularly. Neither the company nor the government has said when, or whether, the melting shop will resume production.

The investigation and the detentions

A chief inspector of the Social Security Institution has been assigned to the case, and inspectors will examine the crane, the maintenance work and the chain of responsibility. The Ministry of Labour and Social Security, through its minister Vedat Isikhan, said earlier inspections had found no serious safety problems, and that inspectors would examine whether negligence played a role. Prosecutors' conclusions will decide the official account.

Turkish media say the company's chairman was detained, and reports differ on whether arrest warrants were issued for senior plant officials. Two union representatives were detained on Monday outside the hospital in Aliaga while trying to make a statement about workplace safety.

Reaction, and a record of earlier deaths

Labour groups blamed unsafe working conditions and called protests on Tuesday evening in Aliaga, Istanbul and Ankara. Tulay Hatimogullari, co-chair of the DEM Party, visited the site, called the blast a workplace murder and demanded the resignation of the labour and industry ministers and senior safety officials. The main opposition party called for a parliamentary inquiry into the explosion and the plant's safety record.

Turkish media and labour groups say the blast followed two other fatal incidents at the plant within three weeks. One Turkish daily reported that at least 11 workers had died there over the past decade. That figure could not be verified and the company has not answered it in detail.

Relatives waited for forensic identification on Tuesday, and the first funerals were held in Izmir province. The accident recalls larger disasters in Turkish industry, including the 2014 Soma coal mine fire that killed 301 miners and the 2022 explosion at a state-owned coal mine in Amasra that killed 41. In each case, the questions that followed concerned inspections, subcontracting and enforcement, and those are the questions now facing the authorities in Aliaga.

An electric arc furnace melts scrap steel with an electric arc and holds the metal at temperatures well above 1,500 degrees Celsius, so a heavy load falling into one can throw out molten metal and flame. That is the setting the governor described, and it fits the deputy justice minister's statement that the victims died of severe burns. The inquiry will be looking at specific questions: how the crane load was secured, whether the vessel replacement was planned and supervised according to the maintenance procedure, whether workers were kept clear of the area beneath the lift, and whether the earlier fatal incidents at the plant were investigated and acted on. The labour minister's statement that earlier inspections found no serious problems will itself be tested by the findings, and the opposition's demand for a parliamentary inquiry means the question of inspection standards across the industry is likely to stay on the agenda.