Chapter 7
"Can you do this, Song Mu?"
Tang Ruxin threw the same words to Song Mu without giving him a chance to say no. She handed the most difficult police task to Song Mu, while she took on the easier task of the Emergency Bureau.
It's not that she is afraid of difficulties, it's just like Tian Ji's horse racing.
The police were a tough nut to crack, and she didn't think she could crack them. She sent Song Mu to test their limits. If there was no room for maneuver, that was to be expected. However, if Yu Zhe asked, she could offer a few words. As for Sun Chengze, she had put in enough effort, so even if she couldn't gain his cooperation, there was still hope of getting him to stop holding on so tightly.
Tang Ruxin's plan was down-to-earth and she did not have high expectations, but reality still caught her off guard.
The police and the Emergency Management Bureau established a joint investigation team the next day and requested that Donghe Refining and Chemical Company send a member to participate. This person needed to have a good understanding of the equipment involved in the accident, have a strong voice, and be able to quickly coordinate and fully mobilize the company's human and material resources to provide full cooperation.
People laugh out loud when they are speechless. Tang Ruxin always felt that this statement was too absolute until this moment.
"Oh, just tell me my name."
There are only two people who meet both conditions.
The equipment associated with that well belonged to different production units, and only those in the Production Operations Department and the Quality, Safety, and Environmental Protection Department had full knowledge of the entire process. They also needed to be able to quickly and fully mobilize all company resources, which required at least a director-level position; even a vice president was a stretch. The production director was already 54 years old; could we still expect him to traverse high and low levels to conduct on-site investigations?
"I've already reported it." Song Mu thought he was ahead of his leader and said with a little pride.
Tang Ruxin grabbed the folder and threw it at him.
"No, if you don't get involved, how can you guide the police to investigate the murder case?" Song Mu shouted while blocking.
Tang Ruxin was disappointed with the situation, and there were many ways to guide him. A hint or a reminder at a critical moment would be enough, and it would be best if it could be done quietly. Now that she was directly involved, whether the police investigation was towards a murder case or not, it would be difficult for her to clear herself.
If it was classified as an accident, it went without saying that she would be removed from the list and Donghe Refining and Chemical would never again be able to obtain J-fuel production licenses. But if it was classified as a homicide, she would be the biggest beneficiary and even directly involved in the investigation. How could this be justified? To ensure the reliability of the conclusion, she would most likely have to move on, but she would only have preserved the company's development opportunities.
Why is she so selfless?
Song Mu didn't think of all this, he just felt that it was a golden opportunity. When the police contacted him, he made the decision on behalf of his leader and sent Tang Ruxin's basic information to the investigation team.
If the investigation team hadn't been so demanding on the company's cooperation requirements, Tang Ruxin would have immediately sent Song Mu to work as an industrial cleaner, with her being the only other choice. He dared to make the final decision on everything, and Tang Ruxin suspected that Song Mu had replaced all his brain cells with dog courage, the kind that could do anything.
The matter is done, there is no point in trying to kill Song Mu.
Tang Ruxin changed into work clothes and reported to the joint investigation team.
The investigation team is small, with two people from the Emergency Bureau, two from the police, and Tang Ruxin, who is responsible for providing professional knowledge and allocating resources.
Of the five, only one newcomer arrived from the Emergency Management Bureau. Her name was Lin Shuangjiang. She wore black-framed glasses and rarely smiled. Her greetings were concise and to the point, her name omitted. Ding Xinqiao, however, smiled and explained that she was a newly assigned top student and rather reserved.
Hearing the words "newly assigned," Chen Jingzhou straightened up unconsciously, as if he had found a companion. He sent a message to Lao Zhao: "Uncle Zhao, there's someone newer than me in the investigation team!"
Zhao Guoliang was concerned about the case, but since he was already in the archives team and couldn't directly intervene in the investigation, he asked Chen Jingzhou to tell him about the investigation and to call him if he needed help. Unexpectedly, Chen Jingzhou was looking for a remote chat partner, and he sent him messages about all sorts of trivial matters.
Zhao Guoliang, who was recording electronic file information, placed his mobile phone upside down on the table and concentrated on his work.
The five-member team met, exchanged contact information, and confirmed their respective investigative directions before splitting up. Ding Xinqiao led Lin Shuangjiang to review the blueprints and device operation, while Yu Lei and Chen Jingzhou conducted field research to determine the deceased's social connections and mental state.
Tang Ruxin was on standby, going wherever she was needed for cooperation - she had no chance to complete the "arrangements" arranged by Tang Jiulin.
After two days on standby, Tang Ruxin sensed something was amiss. While they claimed they needed the company's cooperation, in reality, it was simply a matter of maintaining a fair and transparent investigation. Both sides were wary of her. Different fields are often different, especially since the police had little knowledge of the process sites. If Tang Ruxin were to ask for advice, she could easily be expected to speak out of her own bias.
Yu Lei consulted Ding Xinqiao more often, as they were the ones who formed a united front.
"Is it possible that this leak was artificially created?" Yu Lei asked, pointing to an enlarged photo.
The photo shows a huge gray-green screw valve. Several sand holes can be clearly seen at the bottom of the valve body, which are holes caused by corrosion.
Ding Xinqiao thought for a moment and said, "If you really want to do it, you can do it. It's just time-consuming and laborious, and it won't happen overnight."
"How to do it?" Yu Lei continued to ask.
Ding Xinqiao thought for a longer time. He didn't know how to explain wet hydrogen sulfide corrosion to a complete layman.
"The dry gas feed to the unit carries sulfiding agents. When ionized in water, the sulfiding agents become acidic, causing electrochemical corrosion of the pipeline steel. The corroded steel then undergoes hydrogen embrittlement and cracking, forming these trachoma holes." Tang Ruxin enlarged the photo projected on the wall. "This leaking valve is a flow control valve. The sulfur-containing wastewater from the four units, as well as the drain from the buffer tanks and the venting of the level gauges, will ultimately converge into this pipeline."
"And then?" Chen Jingzhou's eyes were dull, as if he was listening to a foreign language.
"Is there a high possibility that this pipeline is corroded?" Yu Lei didn't quite understand.
Ding Xinqiao pondered and shook his head, adding, "This pipeline does connect the discharge points of multiple devices, but each device's discharge outlet is equipped with a sulfur concentration detector. If the sulfur content of the sewage passing through is too high, the detector will trigger a remote alarm. Upon receiving the alarm signal, the central control room will immediately reduce the discharge volume or directly shut off the sewage valve. This flow control valve is located far behind the detector. If the discharge volume of excessive sewage upstream is controlled in a timely manner, theoretically, it should not cause such severe valve corrosion."
"Is there any place on this pipeline between each detector and this valve that can be opened?" Yu Lei looked through the equipment layout diagrams of each device, but couldn't find where this line was.
"Layout diagram of underground pipelines for public works." Lin Shuangjiang reminded from the side.
"Forget it, I don't understand." Yu Lei gave up and pushed the blueprint aside. "Mr. Tang, where can I find the historical alarm status of these detectors?"
Tang Ruxin sat down at her computer, opened the distributed architecture interface for the relevant devices, flipped to the data display for the remote transmitter, called up the historical trend chart for the day of the incident, took a screenshot, and immediately closed the interface. Her movements were so smooth and swift that it was hard to tell which keys she typed.
Ding Xinqiao raised his eyebrows and looked at her in surprise.
He'd been to numerous chemical plants, large and small, but few executives could perform this operation so skillfully. At least this was the first time he'd seen one. Even experienced plant operators couldn't always match this retrieval speed, which showed Director Tang had been on the front lines quite a bit.
The four screenshots divide the huge electronic display screen on the wall into four equal parts, arranged neatly for easy viewing.
Yu Lei looked at Ding Xinqiao, who nodded, confirming that Tang Ruxin hadn't manipulated the data trends to fool him. He made no secret of his wariness of Tang Ruxin, which made her both angry and amused. She felt the absurdity of being questioned by a poor student after solving a problem.
All four trend graphs appear stable, without a single abnormal alarm. This means the sulfur content in the wastewater from these facilities has never exceeded the standard.
"How many days' data is this?" Ding Xinqiao asked.
Tang Ruxin paused and said, "Seven days."
Ding Xinqiao stopped talking and looked at Tang Ruxin with a smile.
Tang Ruxin cursed inwardly, operated the computer again to return to the device interface, adjusted the display time of the data trend to one month, took a screenshot and spread it out on the screen.
Chen Jingzhou couldn't help but whistle when he saw these four trend charts. As the time span lengthened, the trend curves tightened, fluctuating like an electrocardiogram. Several points even displayed red alarms, indicating that the sulfur content in the wastewater was indeed exceeding the standard.
Liu Dong died four days ago. Tang Ruxin had retrieved seven days' worth of data for the first time, but only three days were valid for their investigation. Furthermore, pipeline corrosion to the point of trachoma couldn't have occurred in just a few days; it would have taken at least months.
In reality, even a month wasn't very convincing. Ding Xinqiao's idea required six months of data analysis to determine whether this level of corrosion had occurred. However, this meant that Donghe Refining and Chemical either had problems controlling major hazard sources or managing equipment corrosion. Tang Ruxin clearly didn't want to expose other issues within Donghe Refining and Chemical's professional management to the Emergency Management Bureau.
Ding Xinqiao looked at Tang Ruxin and found that she was also looking at him, with a hint of grievance in her eyes. He was stunned for a moment, and under Tang Ruxin's gaze, he was inexplicably unable to open his mouth.
"Engineer Ding, can these sewage cause that level of corrosion?" Yu Lei frowned as he looked at the four pictures. He could only see that there were indeed many exceeding-standard alarms in this month, but he could not directly link them to the valve corrosion situation.
Ding Xinqiao pondered for a moment and replied cautiously, "Not necessarily. It also depends on the valve body material and the other components of the material flowing through it. Hydrogen sulfide isn't the only thing that can cause steel corrosion. The hydrogen sulfide detector isn't installed to prevent corrosion. The short-term lethal concentration of hydrogen sulfide is only 1000ppm. At this concentration, you can't smell it, but contact with it will be fatal, so the detector is installed."
"What's 1000ppm?" Yu Lei asked casually, "If the concentration doesn't reach this, will there be a smell?"
"I know that," Chen Jingzhou replied quickly. "1000 ppm is 1.4 grams per cubic meter. Low concentrations of hydrogen sulfide smell like rotten eggs, but high concentrations have no smell."
Yu Lei nodded, his gaze still fixed on the trend charts. He walked forward, stood in front of the electronic screen, and studied it carefully, his brow furrowed in thought.
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