Five people familiar with the plant operations told Reuters, that a fire broke out in an olefins unit on Friday (May 5), at a Shell company chemical plant in Texas, United States. Meanwhile, Houston Fire Department took to Twitter and wrote that they are present on the scene and “providing mutual aid,” without any further information about those injured or killed due to the incident.
“Please avoid the area due to heavy emergency traffic,” said Fire Chief Samuel Peña, in the statement.
The incident occurred in the Texas city of Houston’s suburb of Deer Park. Sources told news agency Reuters, that a large column of black smoke could be seen rising from the fire in the Olefins unit located near Highway 225.
This was later confirmed by Harris County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Thomas Gilliland who said the fire was at a Shell facility and the officers received a service call just after 3:00 pm (local time) to help divert traffic around the plant.
Meanwhile, Harris County Sheriff, Ed Gonzalez said that they are receiving some “preliminary reports of some type of explosion at an industrial plant” and “responding units can see fire from the freeway.”
The news agency report, citing anonymous sources familiar with the refinery’s operations also said that the neighbouring Mexican oil company Pemex plant continued operations despite the fire. Subsequently, the company issued a statement saying the fire was not at one of its units and its emergency response team was assisting in battling the blaze.
The cause of the fire was not immediately known. As of 4:00 pm (local time), all personnel at the plant at the time the fire broke out had been accounted for, reported the local media. City officials, in an advisory, said there was no shelter-in-place order for residents.
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