One man was killed and another injured in an industrial accident at a Giles County mine and lime production plant Friday evening.

Robert Lee Burton, 50, a maintenance worker at a Chemical Lime Co. plant in Kimballton, was killed as he reinstalled a fan on a large piece of machinery, said his brother-in-law Alvin Holt, 38, who works at the plant and was present when Burton was killed.

A second man, Delbert Collins, 34, was treated and released from an area hospital after the accident.

Holt said workers were using an 8-foot metal pipe to push a fan onto the shaft of an engine that feeds coal dust fuel into a large heating kiln where lime is separated from mined limestone.

The pipe became dislodged and struck both men in the head, knocking out Collins and killing Burton, Holt said.

Burton worked at the plant for 26 years and had performed the task that killed him many times, Holt said.

"It was a freak accident," Holt said.

Ken Cage, vice president of human resources at Chemical Lime - a Texas-based lime production company owned by the Belgian Lhoist Group - said the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration is investigating the accident.

Cage said the company will not release detailed information about the accident until after the agency issues its results.

But he said the nonunion facility has an excellent safety record and that Burton's death is the first fatality since Chemical Lime purchased the plant and mine in 1999.

In 1993, two miners were crushed inside the mine, then owned by APG Lime Corp., when a roof section fell in.

More than 100 employees work at the Kimballton mine and production plant, which produces calcium oxide or lime, a white substance used to manufacture cement, paper, steel and other goods.