Fires engulfed three separate oil facilities owned by the same company in one day. According to TheBlaze, The oil facilities were owned by Pemex and located in Texas and Mexico.
Petroleos Mexicanos, best known as Pemex, had fires at three of their oil facilities on Thursday. The infernos left eight people injured and five others missing as of Thursday night. One person died in the fire, according to Bloomberg.
Five people were unaccounted for and three were hospitalized following a fire at a Pemex storage facility in Ixhuatlan del Sureste in the Mexican state of Veracruz, according to the state-owned Mexican petroleum company.
The fire was extinguished. However, the cause of the blaze has yet to be determined. Pemex also confirmed that there was also a fire at its Minatitlan refinery in Veracruz, Mexico. Five people were injured in that fire. The fire did not affect the refinery’s operations and did not damage any equipment, according to the oil company.
Pemex said, “It is presumed that the possible cause of the fire was product runoff on a hot surface.” On the same day, a third fire broke out at the Pemex-run refinery in Deer Park, Texas. The fire was extinguished, and the incident was downgraded to an “all-clear” situation. Video shows thick, black smoke billowing out of the oil facility fire, and could be seen from miles away.
There have been dangerous and deadly accidents at Pemex facilities in the past. Reuters reported on Friday, “Earlier this week, at least two people died after a vehicle collision inside a Pemex refinery in the Mexican state of Hidalgo, according to local media reports.”
Last November, 19 people were injured after a leaking pipeline carrying ethane gas exploded in Veracruz. Last September, a gas pipeline in the Mexican state of Tabasco exploded, forcing the evacuation of all workers at the Paredón Hydrocarbon Separation Station.
