Bhopal Gas Tragedy
Forty Years of Struggle for Justice—Part One
Jayaprakash, N.D.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2024/12/02/bhopal-gas-tragedy-forty-years-of-struggle-for-justice-part-one/
Date Written: 2024-12-02
Publisher: CounterPunch
Year Published: 2024
Resource Type: Article
Cx Number: CX25240
First part of a twelve-part series to commemorate forty years of the quest for justice for the Bhopal Gas Tragedy victims.
Abstract:
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Excerpt:
The escape of noxious fumes from the premises of the pesticide factory operated by Union Carbide India Limited (UCIL) and controlled by Union Carbide Corporation (UCC, a US-based multinational company, presently wholly owned by the Dow Chemical Company) on the night of December 2–3, 1984 exposed the people of the city of Bhopal to highly poisonous gases.
Bhopal, the capital of Madhya Pradesh in central India, was then inhabited by nearly 900,000 people. The leakage occurred due to exothermic reactions that set off within a partially buried stainless steel tank containing about 42 tonnes of an extremely volatile and highly toxic chemical called methyl isocyanate (MIC), which was stored in liquid form.
The equivalent of nearly 30 tonnes of MIC and its pyrolysis products reportedly escaped from the storage tank of the pesticide factory, which was located on the northwestern edge of Bhopal. Aided by a gentle breeze in the southeasterly direction, the burgeoning cloud of heavy lethal gases soon enveloped nearly 40 sq. km of the city, causing havoc in its wake before slowly dissipating in about two hours.
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