ArcelorMittal’s blast furnace A, at the Gijón factory, had to be stopped yesterday and furnace B was forced to reduce its production to a minimum as a result of the derailment at four in the morning of a torpedo train that was transporting pig iron between the head from the Veriña factory and the Tabaza steelworks, belonging to the Avilés factory.
The interruption of rail traffic between the two production centers meant that the LDA steelworks stopped early in the morning due to the impossibility of receiving pig iron from Veriña until circulation was reestablished on the internal railways of the factories.
The derailed convoy managed to be reinstated on the track in the afternoon, which then allowed the process of gradual normalization of production to begin.
The accident made it necessary to dispose of the pig iron produced in the blast furnaces, throwing it into the pits given the impossibility of the Gijón steelworks being able to assume the transformation of all production.
The railway accident did not cause personal injury, although, according to some testimonies, there was a spill of pig iron in the vicinity of the track.