Update: At Least Four Injured In Explosion At West Texas Oil Refinery
February 18, 2008 by national
Filed under Incident Reports
Authorities are now saying that at least four people have been injured in today’s refinery explosion in Big Spring, Texas (about halfway between Dallas and El Paso).
The explosion also caused the evacuation of two elementary schools before classes were cancelled for all nine Big Spring school campuses. Classes were also cancelled at Howard College.
A spokesman for Alon USA, the company that owns the refinery, says all workers have been accounted for after this morning’s blast. One worker is known to be in a local burn unit.
The spokesman also says a fire sparked by the blast is now under control. The company still doesn’t know what caused the explosion.
The blast sent black smoke into the sky, rattled residents and prompted officials to shut down a nearby highway, Interstate 20.
The mayor’s wife says the blast shook her home, which is about two miles away from the refinery.
An editor at the Big Spring Herald, which is also about two miles away, says he thought the blast would “knock the walls down.”
The refinery employs about 170 people and produces about 70,000 barrels of oil a day.
