Norske Skog’s Albury plant is back up and running, with the team managing all hazards following the fatal gas leak that occured last month.

Tom Johnson, a contractor who was exposed to the hydrogen sulfide gas during the leak, is now home from hospital, following ten days of life support along with additional time spent recuperating.

Milo Foster, general manager, Norske Skog Albury, says, “Hydrogen sulfide is a normal byproduct in small amounts of paper and pulp processing. This was a large amount however, the investigation on the root cause of the gas generation is still underway.

"We have started up, we have managed all the hazards at this stage that we can think of, and SafeWork is aware of our start up and the actions we have taken.

“We have had paper off the machine as of Wednesday.

“Tom was on life support for roughly nine or ten days, and in the hospital for a couple more days, but he has now been home for just over a week, and is in good shape.

“He was a contractor here for the maintenance job, but will come visit us with his father soon.

“We have our paper machine running, the largest newsprint machine in the Southern Hemisphere.

“It is a return to normalcy, psychologically it is good for everyone to be back at work, even though it would not be the same again.

“We are pretty much back to normal after being up and running for a week.

“We have had very good support from the community, from the employees, the families, a lot of people that aren’t formally dealing with the company, and our suppliers have been very supportive, and we thank everyone for all that through this crisis.”

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