Essar Steel Algoma lost their only operating blast furnace late last week (see Friday article in our newsletter) due to the failure of a bustle pipe which supplies hot blast into the furnace. The mill has evaluated the damage and has reported their results to Steel Market Update earlier today (Monday):

"We have completed an assessment of the damage caused by the failure of the bustle pipe on No. 7 blast furnace.

Based on our targeted repair plan, best case scenario for start up is Monday, October 5 with an expectation for usable metal within 3 to 5 days thereafter. It should be understood there is always an element of unknown when dealing with repairs of this nature and the timeline will be subject to review as repairs progress. No. 6 blast furnace will be readied as a back up in the event it is required.

A previously scheduled steelmaking maintenance outage has been pulled ahead and the reline of No. 4 vessel is underway.

Production at the Plate and Strip mills and all finishing units continues this week."

The question now is how much melt will the mill lose and do they have enough slabs to not impact their current order book. The number 7 furnace is rated at 8400 short tons per day. It appears the mill will lose approximately 14 days of production which means if the furnace was operating at peak capacity at the time of the accident the mill lost 117,600 short tons of hot metal.

SMU will continue to watch this story as it develops.