Tyson corn bin collapses

It wasn’t until a ‘huge plume of dust’ settled that team members at Tyson Foods’ storage facility near Ramsey knew what had happened Monday at about noon.
What caused the dust was the collapse of a bin that contained about 150,000 bushels of corn, David Whittington, complex manager of Tyson’s Corydon plant, said yesterday (Tuesday).
Whittington said no one was injured when the bin, one of the original ones from when the facility was constructed in 1978, collapsed. It appears that the top of the bin gave way, he said.
Officials, including those from the corporate field mill engineering group, are investigating.
There are five other storage bins on the property.
‘We’re cleaning up today,’ Whittington said yesterday.
Of the 150,000 bushels that were stored in the bin, he estimated that about half of it was on the ground, adding that the corn is in good condition and is salvageable.
Whittington, who has been at the Corydon plant since 1999, said he has never had a bin collapse here before.
‘Occasionally, a metal-type bin will collapse or rupture,’ he said.
Tyson is in the process of accepting bids to replace the damaged bin.