Seventeen people were injured at a U.S. Steel plant near Pittsburgh when an oven exploded Wednesday, emergency officials said.

According to Allegheny County spokesman Kevin Evanto said the powerful blast in the coke oven at United States STeel Corp.’s Clairton Coke Works happened shortly after 9:30 a.m. Wednesday. Most of the workers suffered burns, Evanto said.

“It’s a miracle that anybody even walked away from that,” Allegheny County Emergency Services Chief Bob Full said.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration had a team of investigators on the site looking into the cause of the explosion. Allegheny County Air Quality Program manager Jim Thompson said a large cloud of smoke seen at the plant and other factors indicate the explosion may have been caused by the gas used to heat one of the coke ovens.

If you or someone you love has been injured in a Pennsylvania, please contact the Philadelphia personal injury lawyers of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. by calling 215-238-1130.

A Pennsylvania worker’s compensation payment was appealed by her employer. The Pennsylvania Workers’ Compensation Appeal Board sided with the employer, citing untimeliness on the worker’s behalf.

The worker had originally won a compensation payment following a disc herniation and radiculopathy case due to work-related strain on May 25, 2007. The injury occurred after the worker had manually cleaned 42 tanning beds and complained of numbness in her right arm and fingers and extreme pain in her shoulder. The judge originally awarded temporary total disability benefits to the worker.

That decision was reversed after the board revisited the circumstances of the worker’s complaint. The employee discussed an injury, not an injury specifically tied to work circumstances, with an administrator on May 31, 2007. Without disclosing that her injuries were work-related, a letter sent on October 11, 2007 by the worker to her employer reporting the injury was found as an insufficient warning of her disability. The date of injury and date of actual disclosure exceeded 120 days, leading the board to side with the employer. Under Section 311 of the Workers’ Compensation Act, she was denied her benefits.

This case illustrates the need for professionalism and timeliness in dealing with workers’ compensation. If you or someone you love has been injured, you may be entitled to compensation. Contact the Philadelphia personal injury lawyers at Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C., by calling 215-238-1130 today.