Union establishes webpage to take contributions for families and survivor affected by gas disaster at Norske Skog paper mill

The Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union has created the portal to help the families of Ben Pascall and Lyndon Quinlivan who died after fatal exposure to hydrogen sulphide at Norske Skog. 

Tom Johnson, who remains critically injured in Albury hospital due to the incident, will also benefit.

Border union organiser Dave Corben said the page –  www.amwu.org.au/norske_skog_tragedy – would be promoted nationally through workers’ groups.

“A number of people have been saying ‘what can we do, can we give some money?’, so we’re offering that (opportunity),” Mr Corben said.

Mr Corben said the mill’s union delegates would determine the money’s dispersal.

Meanwhile, mill manager Milo Foster said production was still sometime away from resuming as investigations continue to determine the “root cause” of the gas spread.

“It’s unlikely to be next week and we do have the funerals next week, so we want to make sure anybody, who would like to attend those, is able to,” he said.

Mr Pascall will be farewelled on Monday morning at St Matthew’s Anglican Church, while Mr Quinlivan’s funeral will be at the same location at 1.30pm Wednesday.

Norske Skog’s corporate vice-president for health and safety has flown to Australia from the company’s head office in Norway to investigate last week’s tragedy.

He has been joined by the general manager of the firm’s New Zealand mill and the safety boss of its Tasmanian newsprint plant.

“WorkSafe is doing what they’re doing and we’re also doing an internal investigation which we do even with near misses,” Mr Foster said.

He said counselling for workers had been popular.

“There’s been a couple of counsellors on-site and they’re pretty much booked out, so it’s been well taken advantage of and we’ve had some group sessions with the crew that was on (at the time of the incident),” Mr Foster said. 

While you’re with us, did you know that you can now receive updates straight to your inbox each day at 6am from The Border Mail? To make sure you’re up to date with all the Border and North East news, visit our homepage and sign up.