U.S. Chemical Safety Board Receives Award for Its Much-Watched Safety Video YouTube Channel

February 14, 2025
 

Washington D.C. February 14, 2025 – This week the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB) received a “Silver Play Button” award from YouTube, which recognizes the CSB for having more than 100,000 subscribers for the agency’s YouTube channel @USCSB.  The CSB’s YouTube channel, which features the agency’s highly successful safety videos, currently has 364,000 subscribers and continues to grow. 

 

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The CSB’s safety video program is an important tool to enhance public safety, protect workers and communities, and inform the chemical industry of ways to help prevent catastrophic chemical accidents.  The CSB is a small federal agency with a small annual budget, and the agency’s YouTube channel has been an efficient and effective way for the agency to share the many important findings and safety lessons from the CSB’s investigations to a very large audience. The CSB’s safety videos are widely used for safety training throughout the chemical industry and also are increasingly being used in curricula to help educate chemical engineers and safety professionals about chemical hazards.

 

Shauna Lawhorne, who oversees the CSB’s safety video program, said, “The CSB’s safety video program has been an extraordinarily successful way for the agency to provide critical information to a very wide audience of safety managers and workers at chemical facilities across the country, as well as stakeholders, government officials, and the public at large.   The CSB’s safety video channel has more subscribers than the YouTube channels for even some of the very large, more well-known government agencies.”

 

Since 2007, when the CSB launched the agency’s YouTube channel, the CSB has released nearly 100 safety videos that have received over 65 million combined views.  Some of the most widely viewed videos include: Blowout in Oklahoma (3.7 million views) about the January 2018 blowout and fire at the Pryor Trust gas well in Pittsburg County, Oklahoma, that killed five workers; The Danger of Popcorn Polymer (3.3 million views) about the November 2019 explosions and fires at the TPC Group Chemical Plant in Port Neches, Texas, which seriously injured three workers and caused $450 million in on-site property damage and $150 million in off-site property damage to nearby homes and businesses; and Fatal Exposure: Tragedy at DuPont (3.2 million views) about three incidents that occurred over a 33-hour period at the Dupont plant in Belle, West Virginia, in January 2010, one of which fatally injured an employee.

 

The CSB’s video, Wake Up Call: Refinery Disaster in Philadelphia, about the June 2019 fire, explosions, and toxic hydrofluoric acid release at the Philadelphia Energy Solutions (PES) refinery in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, received over one million views in just the first nine days after it was posted on the CSB‘s YouTube channel.  In 2023, the CSB received Silver Telly Awards for both the PES safety video and another safety video. 

 

The CSB is an independent federal agency charged with investigating incidents and hazards that result, or may result, in the catastrophic release of extremely hazardous substances. The agency’s core mission activities include conducting incident investigations; formulating preventive or mitigative recommendations based on investigation findings and advocating for their implementation; issuing reports containing the findings, conclusions, and recommendations arising from incident investigations; and conducting studies on chemical hazards.

 

The agency's board members are appointed by the president subject to Senate confirmation. The Board does not issue citations or fines but makes safety recommendations to companies, industry organizations, labor groups, and regulatory agencies such as OSHA and EPA.

 

Please visit our website, www.csb.gov. For more information, contact Communications Manager Hillary Cohen at [email protected].

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