A blast furnace accident at Tata Steel's Meramandali unit in Dhenkanal district left 18 workers injured on Tuesday, even as authorities began an internal probe to figure out how hot steam leaked from the furnace during a routine inspection. Dhenkanal SP Gyanaranjan Mohapatra said the steam leaked after a valve went off during maintenance work in the blast furnace. All the injured were admitted in a private hospital in Cuttack, where the condition of two persons were stated to be critical by doctors, the SP said. A Tata Steel statement said the accident occurred due to escape of steam at a blast furnace at 1 pm.
