TEXAS CITY, Texas - A furnace at the BP refinery has exploded and burned, sending 10 people to a hospital for treatment of exposure to chemicals.
The furnace fire followed multiple blasts that rocked the Houston Ship Channel-area petrochemical complex about 6:30 p.m. Tuesday was fueled by naphtha, a petroleum feed stock used at the refinery, said Bruce C. Clawson, the Texas City emergency management director.
Regulatory agencies will conduct investigations into the incident, which forced the evacuation of the plant for several hours Tuesday night.
"There was a boom, followed by two more booms," said Tommy Clark, who was in his office at Trey Industries not far from the refinery when the blasts occurred. "It shook the whole building."
Clawson said an internal investigation was also under way, following a heightened security alert from recent reports from the FBI and industry groups that refineries in this area might be targeted by terrorists.
"That was one of our first concerns" with the blasts, Clawson told the Texas City Sun in Wednesday's editions. "But there is no indication of that, none at all."
Ten people reported to Mainland Center Hospital complaining of exposure, said spokesman Harold Fattig. He said a decontamination area had been set up in case dangerous chemicals had been released into the air.
BP spokeswoman Annie Smith said operations resumed late Tuesday.
The blasts prompted an early ending to high school baseball and softball action between the Texas City Stings and the La Marque Cougars. Texas City's junior varsity baseball team, which had been in La Marque for a game, sheltered in place at the student center at College of the Mainland.
Some College of the Mainland evening classes were dismissed.
The Texas City refinery is the largest of BP's four refineries in the Houston area. It has the capacity to refine 435,000 barrels of crude oil daily.
By Jennifer Wilson, Amarillo Globe-News, Texas Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
Mar. 27 - A national multimillion-dollar grant is helping America fight bioterrorism -- and Amarillo College has joined the battle.
AC was chosen last fall to take part in Texas CARES, a grant program run by the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio. The program, funded by $459,000 in federal grant money from the Department of Homeland Security, develops bioterrorism training materials for medical professionals and students.
AC is the only community college in the state to participate in the program, said Danita McAnally, director of institutional effectiveness and advancement. She made the first contact with grant program officials.
The San Antonio university chose AC because it offers a variety of allied health programs, from dental hygiene to radiography, McAnally said. The program aims to integrate bioterrorism training into these courses.
"It becomes more amazing to me all the time," she said.
AC will not receive any funds from the grant, McAnally said, but Amarillo will benefit by working with bioterrorism experts from across the state and showcasing the city's expertise.
Jim Clements is developing bioterrorism curricula to use in his AC classes. He is director of fire and environmental programs.
A key part of this will be teaching individuals to work in an "incident command system" that organizes all the fire, health, emergency and law enforcement officials into a chain of command when disaster strikes, Clements said.
"Without it you just have chaos," Clements said.
Clements also is working with others from San Antonio, Dallas and Laredo -- cities also involved in the grant -- to develop a separate bioterrorism course that could be used in schools across the country. It's been a good opportunity to share knowledge with officials across the state, he said.
"Each one of us has their own area of extra expertise," Clements said.
AC isn't the only Amarillo entity involved. Officials from the city of Amarillo, local fire and law enforcement agencies and the Canyon office of the Texas Department of Health also are taking part.
And the more prepared these individuals are, the better, said Theresa West, who works with Amarillo's emergency management department.
"I honestly feel that the more educated our population is about response effort, it just makes all of our lives easier," West said. "It calms down the panic."
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© 2004, Amarillo Globe-News, Texas. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.