March 19, 2019 – New York, NY – A chemical fire at the Houston Ship Channel site has ignited at a petrochemical storage site, Intercontinental Terminals Co. (ITC) located in a suburban area outside of Houston, where it has been ablaze for over 24 hours. The blaze is expected to burn for another two days, according to authorities on Monday.
As reported from NBC News, it appears that the cause of the incident derived from a leak in a tank containing volatile naphtha, which ignited and spread to other storage tanks within the same complex.
The burning tanks held naphtha and xylene, fuels used in gasoline, toluene, and plastics, while other tanks held base oils mostly utilized for machine lubricants.
The Houston Ship Channel site in Deer Park, Texas, houses nine U.S. oil refineries, which process 2.3 million barrels per day, roughly 12% of the national’s total.
Nearby residents were encouraged to remain indoors, as the city of Deer Park set a shelter-in-place order for residents in the area. ITC is owned by Japan’s Mitsui & Co. reported no injuries from their staff.
Communications Officer for Channel Industries Mutual Aid, Ray Russell stated, “It’s going to be probably two days” as the fire needs to “…burn out the tank”.
So far, there has been little change in the price of regular gasoline deliveries on the east coast.
Currently, there are six tanks burning near another nine storage tanks. Firefighters, have implemented foam fire retardants on neighboring tanks to limit the spread.
Port agent at the Houston Pilots, J.J. Plunkett stated, “There has been no [effect] vessel traffic other than at the two terminals.”
At this time, the ITC reported that volatile organic compounds were detected six miles away from the site location, yet the levels were below being considered hazardous.
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