Mittal Steel USA is returning one blast furnace to service, then will idle another for maintenance, in order to maintain stable production in its eastern region over the next several months.

Mittal Steel’s Cleveland facility will restart Blast Furnace C-6 Aug. 23 in preparation for the scheduled idling of Cleveland's other blast furnace in October. The company had taken C-6 out of production in May, accelerating maintenance that had been scheduled to be done later, in response to inventory-related market softness. The Cleveland facility’s Blast Furnace C-5 is scheduled to be taken offline in October for extensive repairs to the furnace top.

The overlap will enable the Cleveland plant to cover the company's steelmaking needs during an upcoming 20-day maintenance outage at Mittal Steel’s Sparrows Point facility, where a complete reline is needed at one of the Maryland plant's basic oxygen furnaces.

"This is another example of our plants working together to meet customer requirements," said William Brake, Executive Vice President—Operations East. "After completion of the repairs, C-5 will be returned to service when the order book indicates it is needed."

Operating employees will participate in the maintenance and other activities at the plants during these outages.

Mittal Steel Co. NV is the world's largest and most global steel company. The company has operations in 14 countries, on four continents. Mittal Steel encompasses all aspects of modern steelmaking, to produce a comprehensive portfolio of both flat and long steel products to meet a wide range of customer needs. It serves all the major steel consuming sectors, including automotive, appliance, machinery and construction. For 2004, Mittal Steel had revenues of US$22.2 billion and steel shipments of 42.1 million tons.

Formed in April 2005, Mittal Steel USA consists of Ispat Inland Inc. and Mittal Steel USA ISG Inc., formerly International Steel Group. It has operations in 12 states of the United States and in Trinidad and Tobago.