private limited with share capital 00499821 industry chemicals fate closed in july 2005 successor hickson international plc founded 7 november 1931 1931 11 07 founder bernard hickson colbeck welch headquarters wheldon road castleford wf10 2jt area served worldwide products ddt timber preservatives number of employees c. 1 300 website hickson & welch obsolete hickson & welch was a british chemicals company based in castleford . contents 1 history 1.1 foundation 1.2 public company 1.3 closure 2 explosions 2.1 1926 explosion 2.2 1930 explosion 2.3 1992 explosion 3 structure 3.1 power station 4 products 5 references 6 external links 6.1 video clips history edit ernest hickson had founded a company in 1893 to introduce sulphur black a sulphur dye to the british cotton industry . in 1915 hickson & partners ltd was founded . foundation edit in 1931 hickson & welch ltd was founded from the site that had been destroyed in 1930 . from 1944 the company made ddt becoming the uk s largest manufacturer . hickson and welch holdings ltd was incorporated on 28 september 1951 . it made dyestuffs ddt pesticide and timber preservatives . it had the subsidiaries hickson & welch ltd and hickson s timber impregnation co. g.b. ltd. the timber subsidiary had been founded on 25 october 1946 . the timber preservative contained dinitrophenol and was marketed as triolith tanalith and pyrolith . pyrolith contained a flame proofing agent . public company edit it became a public company on 30 november 1951 . the company became known as hickson international from 1985 . 1 in august 1991 it sold william blythe of lancashire for 23 million to holliday of huddersfield . it bought angus fine chemicals for 22.3 million in july 1992 . closure edit in august 2000 hickson international plc was bought by arch chemicals . at the time hickson employed over 1 300 people had assets of 73 million and a revenue of 208 million . it became known as c6 solutions and closed in july 2005 . 2 the power station still remains . to the east was wheldale colliery and opposite the site is the jungle rugby league ground ; castleford is synonymous with rugby league . the site looking north in july 2004 explosions edit 1926 explosion edit in november 1926 an explosion occurred while workers were packing an intermediate dye thought to be non explosive . two men died . 1930 explosion edit on 4 july 1930 just before noon there was an explosion on the site s nitration plant . it destroyed the factory killing 13 people and injuring 32 people . it made 300 houses in the town uninhabitable . ernest hickson later died natural causes 30 july 1930 and his earlier company was liquidated . inspector j.a.gee of the castleford west riding police was subsequently appointed an obe by hm george v for his work following the explosion . 1992 explosion edit on 21 september 1992 an explosion at the factory killed five workers and injured around two hundred people . at 13.20 a distillation tank of nitrotoluene ignited . the fireball went through the site s control room and killed two men instantly . the fireball then entered a four storey office block ; a woman and two men would later die from their injuries . the explosion cost 3.5 million . former site seen in 2007 structure edit the site was next to the river calder in castleford ings in the north of castleford accessed from the a6032 a656 roundabout . the site was 163 acres . eight hundred people were employed on the castleford site . power station edit powergen now e.on uk installed a 30 million chp gas turbine power station at the site . enel power built the power station which has a 44mw general electric lm6000 engine . the generation equipment was built by nuovo pignone . it has a 13mw steam turbine with the site producing around 56mw of electricity . the power station began operations in october 2002 . products edit wood protection furniture coatings organic chemicals references edit hickson international 2005 closure external links edit hickson & welch obsolete e.on power station video clips edit the site in june 2005 demolition of final structure in 2011 1930 explosion v t e electricity generation in yorkshire and the humber power stations biomass active drax co fires and full biomass eggborough co fires ferrybridge multifuel co fires glanford markham grange proposed future blackburn meadows brigg stallingborough coal active drax eggborough closed blackburn meadows bradford doncaster elland ferrybridge a b & c foss island huddersfield keadby kirkstall mexborough neepsend rotherham sculcoates skelton grange thornhill thorpe marsh wakefield gas active a.h. marks castleford conoco phillips east knapton glanford brigg humber energy chp immingham keadby mothballed killingholme a killingholme b salt end south humber bank thornhill hydro active settle closed linton falls proposed future linton falls incinerators waste active kirklees newlincs sheffield wheldale closed foss island proposed allerton park quarry ferrybridge multi fuel wind active humber gateway keadby royd moor out newton rusholme westermost rough proposed future dogger bank hornsea sober hill organisations drax group pre nationalisation electric power companies yorkshire electricity retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title hickson % 26 welch & oldid 742543914 categories british companies established in 1931buildings and structures in wakefield districtcastlefordchemical companies of the united kingdomchemical plants of the united kingdomcompanies based in west yorkshirecompanies formerly listed on the london stock exchangedefunct companies of englanddefunct manufacturing companies of the united kingdomexplosions in englandmanufacturing companies established in 1931manufacturing companies disestablished in 2005pesticides in the united kingdom2005 disestablishments in the united kingdom navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages add links this page was last modified on 4 october 2016 at 09 38 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; additional terms may apply . by using this site you agree to the terms of use and privacy policy . wikipedia is a registered trademark of the wikimedia foundation inc. a non profit organization . privacy policy about wikipedia disclaimers contact wikipedia developers cookie statement mobile view