Oil plant fire that injured 7 under investigation
Houston-based L-Con’s safety practices eyed by OSHA officials
NEDERLAND — Federal investigators were in the Port Arthur area Saturday to determine how a flash fire started that injured seven workers constructing a crude oil pipeline connection.
“There was welding, a crude oil line and fumes,” said Jeff Shields, Sunoco Logistics spokesman, who was at the site with officials from the contractor, Houston-based L-Con Inc.
Seven L-Con workers were injured. Three were airlifted to burn hospitals in Houston and Galveston. The others went to lo- cal hospitals, Shields said.
Their identities were not released, and no update on their conditions was available Saturday.
L-Con is a 20-year-old company that provides construction management services to energy customers and heavy industrial installations, according to its website.
The U.S. Occupational, Safety and Health Administration was on site, and the investigation will focus on whether safety practices were followed and what caused the fire at 9 p.m. on the eastern edge of the terminal near the Neches River.
Operations did not halt, but the construction site was closed, officials said.
Sunoco operates a marine terminal on the site, as well as 130 aboveground storage tanks with a storage capacity of 24 million barrels of crude oil plus condensate, naphtha, base and extract oils.
Sunoco in early 2014 began receiving crude oil through the Keystone pipeline from Cushing, Oklahoma, almost 500 miles away.
“A lot of pipelines come into this area,” said Deputy Marcus McLellan with the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office.
The docks along the Sabine-Neches Ship Channel contribute to the
area’s rating as the thirdlargest port in the U.S. for overall tonnage, most of it bulk liquids like crude. The four motor fuels refineries in Jefferson County — ExxonMobil, Total Port Arthur, Valero Energy Corp., and Motiva Port Arthur — combine for almost 1.5 million barrels of crude capacity per day.
The affected area of the terminal is not visible from Texas 347, and the incident did not impact residents in the area.
A smoke odor hung in the air Saturday, and a marquee sign along the roadside read, “A good day starts and ends with safety.”