On the day of the accident, the “brutality of an event” broke in on the families of the victims, the company and the whole city, said Leverkusen’s Mayor Uwe Richrath on Friday. “We stand together in mourning.”
Around 200 people took part in the event at an airfield, and several hundred also followed it via a live stream on the Internet. Large-format photos of the victims, for each of which a candle was lit, stood on a stage.
The head of the Chempark operator Currenta, Frank Hyldmar, announced that two memorials would be built. Trees should be planted and memorial plaques put up in front of the disposal center in Leverkusen-Bürrig and in front of the company headquarters in Leverkusen in the coming week. Until the first anniversary of the disaster, the memorial sites would be artistically designed.
The exact cause of the July 27 explosion has not yet been clarified. After initial investigations, a chemical reaction of the waste is suspected. The public prosecutor’s office in Cologne has initiated an investigation against unknown persons on suspicion of negligent homicide and negligent causing of an explosion. She wants to find out whether human errors have led to the disaster.