ArcelorMittal SAfrica says Newcastle furnace fails

Wed Aug 10, 2011

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - ArcelorMittal South Africa, a unit of the world's top steelmaker, said on Wednesday that a furnace at its Newcastle plant had failed and would be out of service for the next two months.

The company said a failure in the gas cleaning plant on Friday led to the dust catcher partially collapsing. There were no injuries.

"The blast furnace will be out of service for two months and we will be exploring alternatives to cover the shortfall in the market," spokesman Themba Hlengani said.

The re-commissioning of the furnace would take an additional two weeks before the plant can return to full production, he said.

The mills will continue producing using available stock until the third week of this month, he said.

The furnace failure is likely to impact an already subdued outlook for the company.

Higher input costs and a strong rand led to a 63 percent drop in the company's first-half profit and the steelmaker forecast a difficult third-quarter, partially due to a recent strike over wages and a planned maintenance shutdown at one of its plants.

Shares in the company are down 23.13 percent so far this year, compared with a 12 percent drop in Johannesburg's Top-40 index of blue-chip companies.