April 21 (Bloomberg) -- Executives at Bayer CropScience AG conducted a “campaign of secrecy,” destroyed evidence and withheld information from emergency responders after a deadly chemical explosion, congressional investigators said.

A report released by investigators on the House Energy and Commerce Committee led by Representative Henry Waxman found that the August 2008 explosion at Bayer’s plant in Institute, West Virginia, “came dangerously close” to igniting several tons of methyl isocyanate, or MIC, a toxic chemical that killed about 4,000 people after a leak in Bhopal, India, in 1984.

The committee’s oversight and investigations panel heard testimony today from Bayer officials and members of the Chemical Safety Board, which is investigating the accident.

On Aug. 28, a pressurized waste tank containing Methomyl exploded, sending a fireball hundreds of feet into the air. One Bayer employee was killed instantly and another suffered third- degree burns and died more than a month later. Eight other people, including six emergency responders and two contract employees, reported symptoms of chemical exposure.

In transcripts of radio communications among fire, police, and emergency medical personnel obtained by the committee, first responders repeatedly complained that “we can’t get through to the plant” and “we have no contact with anybody from the plant.”

‘Breakdown’ in Communication

“We acknowledge fully we had a breakdown in these communications,” Bayer CropScience Chairman William Buckner told the subcommittee. “We have the process in place to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”

Bayer CropScience is a unit of Leverkusen, Germany-based Bayer AG. Its West Virginia plant is the only site in the U.S. that produces and stores large amounts of MIC, which is a component of Methomyl.

In testimony given to the committee’s oversight and investigations panel, Chemical Safety Board Chairman John Bresland said Bayer officials told emergency personnel on the day of the explosion that “no dangerous chemicals had been released.”

“That statement is clearly incorrect, since Methomyl is toxic and its uncontrolled decomposition may release highly toxic byproducts,” Bresland said. The Chemical Safety Board is an independent federal agency.

The explosion ruptured and threw a 2.5-ton steel tank through the plant. Had it struck the MIC container, “the subcommittee today might be examining a catastrophe rivaling the Bhopal disaster,” said Representative Bart Stupak, a Michigan Democrat and chairman of the oversight subcommittee.

Blast Mat

The subcommittee accused Bayer of removing and destroying a protective steel screen, or blast mat, that hung over the MIC tank, which Bayer spokesman Bryan Iams said was not true.

The mat, Iams said in a phone interview, remains on the site and has been examined by chemical board investigators.

“The blast mat remains on our site,” Iams said. “We did not destroy evidence.”

Daniel Horowitz, director of the chemical board’s office of congressional and public affairs, said investigators did see the mat immediately after the explosion, but said that Bayer then moved the equipment without notifying or consulting with investigators first.

“We examined it when it was hanging there,” Horowitz said in an interview.

Disabling of Cameras

The panel also found that a Bayer contractor disabled the plant’s surveillance cameras, depriving investigators of “critical video footage of the explosion.” The removal of the protective blast mat prevented “further analysis of damage caused by shrapnel and debris,” the committee report found.

The report accused Bayer of using a media and legal strategy to limit public disclosure about the accident. In an internal Bayer “community relations strategy” memo obtained by the committee, Bayer’s public relations firm recommended undermining local community groups and news outlets, the report said.

Buckner said “business reasons,” including “a desire to limit negative publicity,” partly motivated the company’s decision.

He told the committee the company thought it could “refuse to provide information” to the Chemical Safety Board and began labeling documents as secret. The company used the Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002, a homeland security law, to declare documents it turned over contained “sensitive security information” that could not be made public.

Training Records

Bresland said that of 10,000 pages of documents submitted to the chemical board, about 12 percent were marked as sensitive security information and therefore not public. Some of those documents included operator training records and prior incident reports that already are public information, Bresland said.

Buckner said the company’s action was in part based on the opinion it received from an outside lawyer. “We fully acknowledge the need for further guidance” on this issue, he said.

Stupak said he will seek to amend the Maritime Transportation Security Act, which is up for renewal this year. He said he is exploring whether companies should be subject to financial penalties when they exceed the scope of the act.

Description of Blast

The explosion at the plant, which occupies more than 400 acres on the Kanawha River, broke windows and cracked walls at buildings several miles away.

The blast occurred at about 10:30 p.m. as workers were bringing the plant back on line following an extended shutdown for maintenance work. Chemical board investigators found that a deficient heater at the facility made it impossible to get the plant running without bypassing safety features.

Workers had a longstanding practice of bypassing valves meant to protect against high concentrations of Methomyl, which “decomposed in a sudden and violent runaway reaction,” Bresland testified.

The blast sent metal projectiles, some weighing 100 pounds, in all directions, he said.

The chemical board will release details of its investigation in two days at a public meeting in Charleston, West Virginia.

To contact the reporter on this story: Lorraine Woellert in Washington at lwoellert@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: April 21, 2009 20:13 EDT