SINGAPORE – The general manager of a Tuas incineration plant (TIP) has been fined $145,000 after a 2021 explosion led to the death of two employees.
On Nov 20, Ng Wah Yong, 56, pleaded guilty to one charge under the Workplace Safety and Health Act.
This comes just two days after Ng’s employer, the National Environmental Agency (NEA), was fined $230,000 on Nov 18 for safety lapses in the 2021 Tuas Incineration Plant explosion.
Another NEA officer, Christopher Lee Yew Binn, 50, divisional director of the waste infrastructure operations and management division of NEA at the time, is scheduled to undergo a pre-trial conference on Nov 28.
Lee also faces a single, similar charge to Ng.
The court heard on Nov 20 that Ng had been appointed general manager of the TIP sometime in 2018, and his duties include overseeing the safety and health of employees at the plant and safety at the workplace.
The charge focused on two major failures on his part as general manager of the plant – including a failure to ensure the PTW system for high-voltage switchgear racking works complied with regulatory requirements, and for failing to establish safe working procedures for such operations.
Ng’s lawyer Stephania Wong had argued that the arc flash explosion had occurred due to an extremely rare fault in the switchgear’s safety mechanism that prevented the circuit breaker from activating on the day.
She said that Ng had inherited the systems and procedures that were established and practiced at TIP for decades, after his appointment as general manager in 2018.
She pointed out that Ng had relied on the authorised personnel, the licensed electrical worker, to carry out high-voltage switchgear racking works compliant with current regulations.
She also added that while it was correct that there was no established safe work procedure when it came to high-voltage racking works, other safety control measures, such as training provided to the electrical maintenance branch team and signages placed around switchgear equipment, were present.
