The $1.2-billion buy-out of Aearo Technologies Inc. will expand 3M’s product portfolio in the personal protection market, says Ken Symns, occupational health and environmental safety business manager at 3M Canada.

Four years ago on Christmas day, an employee working for a company that recycles lead from used batteries paid dearly for failing to wear personal protective equipment.
 

He had just finished moving a container pot filled with molten metal from a furnace to a cooling area when the pot suddenly exploded just as he was reversing his forklift truck. The molten metal, also known as slag, splashed the worker. When the worker jumped out of the forklift truck to go to an emergency shower wash station, more misfortune struck. He slipped on the slag, and ended up receiving third degree burns to both legs, second degree burns to the back of his neck, and third degree burns on his left palm.