in the United States. The refinery sat on a site and was spread across . Workers described the factory as antiquated, with much of the machinery dating back more than twenty-eight years. The site had continued operating because it had good access to rail and shipping links for transport. In the last full fiscal year before the disaster, which ended on September 30, 2007, the facility refined 14.51 million hundredweight of sugar, 9% of the nation's requirements, compared to Imperial's Gramercy, Louisiana, refinery, which refined 11.08 million hundredweight of sugar in the same time period. 90% of the raw sugar supplied to the facility came from overseas in that year, and Imperial expected the "vast majority" to come in from abroad in the year of the explosion as well. In the time leading up to the explosion, Imperial had run into financial difficulties. In the fiscal year ending September 30, 2007, sales had fallen eight percent while the company's profits and stock price had fallen by half. The last two annual reports by Imperial before the explosion said that any damage to the facility at Port Wentworth would "have a material effect on the company's business, financial condition, results of operations and cash flows". Meanwhile, in 2004 the Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB) conducted a study into the risks presented by dust explosions after three fatal accidents in the year before. The West Pharmaceutical Services explosion in North Carolina killed six persons, the CTA Acoustics explosion in Kentucky killed seven, and the Hayes Lemmerz explosion in Indiana killed one, prompting the report. The CSB found that between 1980 and 2005, there had been 281 explosions involving combustible dust, resulting in 119 deaths and 718 injuries. The agency made a number of recommendations to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), which had been partly implemented by 2008. The CSB continued to be concerned about the potential for further fatal accidents up until the explosion at the Imperial refinery in Port Wentworth. Explosion and emergency response The explosion occurred at 7 p.m. local time in what was initially believed to be a room where sugar was bagged by workers. Witnesses from across the Savannah River in South Carolina reported seeing flames shoot up several stories high. There were 112 employees on-site at the time. The explosion occurred in the center of the refinery, where bagging and storage facilities were