Last month, more than 16,000 visitors from 65 countries gathered in Chicago for the annual Bio International Convention, the world’s largest event for the biotech industry. It’s a little like the World’s Fair, with a Belgian pavilion that gathers the country’s participating companies. There, visitors to the convention – not tourists, but businessmen representing other biotech firms – were introduced to, apart from waffles, fries and beer, another of our prestigious exports: biotechnology.
This Monday saw the start of the operation to remove the damaged tanks from the scene of the accident, 10 days after the derailment of the train carrying the chemical acrylonitrile. The six rearmost carriages, which were not derailed, were hosed down and attached to a locomotive to be towed to Dendermonde, about 15km away.