The explosion
At West Fertilizer in West
http://www.mywesttexas.com/top_stories/article_e05cb6da-a7eb-11e2-9667-001a4bcf887a.html
WEST, Texas — A massive
explosion at a fertilizer plant near Waco
on Wednesday injured dozens of people and killed an unknown number of others,
leaving the factory a smoldering ruin and leveling buildings for blocks in
every direction.
The explosion at West Fertilizer in West, a community about
20 miles north of Waco, happened shortly before 8 p.m. and could be heard as
far away as Waxahachie, 45 miles to the north. It sent flames shooting high
into the night sky, and rained burning embers, shrapnel and debris down on
shocked and frightened residents.
Although authorities said it will be some time before they
know the full extent of the loss of life, Texas Department of Public Safety
spokesman D.L. Wilson said just after midnight that an unknown number of people
had died.
West Mayor Tommy Muska told reporters that his city of about
2,800 residents needs "your prayers."
"We've got a lot of people who are hurt, and there's a
lot of people, I'm sure, who aren't gonna be here tomorrow," Muska said.
"We're gonna search for everybody. We're gonna make sure everybody's
accounted for. That's the most important thing right now."
A member of the city council, Al Vanek, said there is a
four-block area around the explosion "that is totally decimated." Wilson said the damage was comparable to the destruction
caused by the 1995 bomb blast that destroyed the Murrah
Federal Building
in Oklahoma City.
Muska, who is also a volunteer firefighter, said the town's
department went to the plant to fight a fire about 6:30 p.m., and the blast
that followed knocked off his fire helmet and blew out the doors and windows of
his home nearby.
He said main fire was under control as of 11 p.m., but
residents were urged to remain indoors because of the threat of new explosions
or leaks of ammonia from the plant's ruins.
Among the damaged buildings was what appeared to be a
housing complex with a collapsed roof, a nearby middle school and the West Rest
Haven Nursing Home, from which first-responders evacuated 133 patients, some in
wheelchairs.
"We did get there and got that taken care of,"
Muska said.
Erick Perez, 21, of West, was playing basketball at a nearby
school when the fire started. He and his friends thought nothing of it at
first, but about a half hour later, the smoke changed color. The blast threw
him, his nephew and others to the ground, and showered the area with hot
embers, shrapnel and debris.
"The explosion was like nothing I've ever seen
before," Perez said. "This town is hurt really bad."
Information was hard to come by in the hours after the
blast, and entry into the town of about 2,800 people was slow-going as the
roads were jammed with emergency vehicles rushing in to help. Texas Gov. Rick
Perry said state officials were waiting for details about the extent of the
damage.
"We are monitoring developments and gathering
information as details continue to emerge about this incident," Perry said
in a statement. "We have also mobilized state resources to help local
authorities. Our thoughts and prayers are with the people of West, and the
first responders on the scene."
Dozens of emergency vehicles amassed at the scene and hours
after the blast, fires were still smoldering in the ruins of the plant and in
several surrounding buildings. Aerial footage showed injured people being
treated on the flood-lit football field that had been turned into a staging
area for emergency responders.
Al Vanek, a West City Council member, said first-responders
were treating victims at about half a dozen sites, and he saw several injured
residents from the nursing home being treated at the community center.
"Tomorrow is going to be a very sad day," Vanek
said.
Glenn A. Robinson, the chief executive of Hillcrest Baptist
Medical Center
in Waco, said
in an interview on CNN that his hospital had received 66 injured people for
treatment, including 38 who were seriously hurt. He said the injuries included
blast injuries, orthopedic injuries, large wounds and a lot of lacerations and
cuts. The hospital has set up a hotline for families of the victims to get
information, he said.
Robinson did not immediately return messages from The
Associated Press.
Messages to Scott Clark, spokesman for Scott and White Hospital
in Temple and Hillcrest
Baptist Medical
Center in Waco, were not returned Wednesday. A
spokesman at Providence
Health Center
was not available for comment, a hospital operator said.
Debby Marak told the AP that when she finished teaching her
religion class Wednesday night, she noticed a lot of smoke in the area across
town near the plant. She said she drove over to see what was happening, and
that when she got there, two boys came running toward her screaming that the
authorities ordered everyone out because the plant was going to explode.
She said she had driven only about a block when the blast
happened.
"It was like being in a tornado," Marak, 58, said
by phone. "Stuff was flying everywhere. It blew out my windshield."
"It was like the whole earth shook."
She called her husband and asked him to come get her. When
they got to their home about 2 miles south of town, her husband told her what
he'd seen: a huge fireball that rose like "a mushroom cloud."
Lucy Nashed, a spokesman for Perry's office, said personnel
from several agencies were en route to West or already there, including the
Texas Commission for Environmental Quality, the state's emergency management
department and an incident management team. Also responding is the state's top
urban search and rescue team, the state health department and mobile medical
units.
American Red Cross crews from across Texas were also heading to the scene. Red
Cross spokeswoman Anita Foster said the group was working with emergency
management officials in West to find a safe shelter for residents displaced
from their homes. She said teams from Austin to Dallas and elsewhere are being sent to the community north
of Waco.
The explosion knocked out power to many area customers and
could be heard and felt for miles around. Lydia Zimmerman told KWTX-TV that
she, her husband and daughter were in their garden in Bynum, 13 miles from
West, when they heard multiple blasts.
"It sounded like three bombs going off very close to
us," she said.
In 2001, an explosion at a chemical plant killed 31 people
and injured more than 2,000 in Toulouse,
France. The
blast occurred in a hangar containing 300 tons of ammonium nitrate, which can
be used for both fertilizer and explosives. The explosion came 10 days after
the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the U.S., and raised fears at the time
it was linked. A 2006 report blamed the blast on negligence.
.