‘Nothing you could do but run,’ as fireball engulfs Pemex oil rig
by Mark Stevenson, The Associated Press
The blast killed four people and forced hundreds of workers to leap into the sea
MEXICO CITY—A huge ball of flames engulfed an oil platform in the Gulf of Mexico on April 1, killing four people and sending terrified workers leaping into the sea.
State-run oil company Petroleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, said it had averted any significant oil spill following the blast, which also injured 16 workers, two seriously, and forced the evacuation of 300.
Pemex later said a total of 45 workers had received some form of treatment or health evaluation.
Firefighters were still working to put out the fire, which was consuming the oil that was on the platform, Pemex Director General Emilio Lozoya said, adding that efforts were “on the right track.” Ten firefighting and emergency boats were deployed.
Speaking at a news conference in the nearby city of Ciudad del Carmen, Lozoya said the cause of the fire was still being investigated, but it appeared to be something mechanical.
Helicopters ferried workers with bandaged hands and faces and burn marks on their overalls to Ciudad del Carmen, where crowds of relatives of oil workers thronged outside hospitals.
A survivor of the blaze on the shallow-water Abkatun-A Permanente platform in the Campeche Sound said workers “jumped into the sea out of desperation and panic.”
“There was nothing you could do but run,” said Roger Arias Sanchez, an employee of Pemex contractor Cotemar who escaped the burning platform in an evacuation boat.
In a statement, Pemex said the accident “did not cause an oil spill into the sea, given that there was only a seepage, which is being taken care of by specialized vessels.”
The company said it had been able to cut off pipelines to avoid a spill, and suggested that the oil remaining in the pipelines was burning off.
Lozoya said the accident “would have a minimal impact on production, because this was a processing platform,” not a producing well. Production from nearby wells it normally serves could be rerouted to other processing platforms.
President Enrique Pena Nieto promised an investigation to “find whoever is responsible” and avoid such accidents in the future.
The Abkatun A platform separates gas, oil and other petroleum products, and pumps them to refineries onshore.
Pemex has had serious security problems in the past, mainly in its onshore pipeline network, where thieves drilled around 2,500 illegal taps in the first nine months of 2014 and stole more than $1 billion in fuel.
That problem got so bad that in February the company announced it would no longer ship finished, usable gasoline or diesel through pipelines.
That apparently hasn’t stopped the thieves, though. Federal police recently seized three tanker trucks and 148,000 litres of stolen fuel at several different sites throughout the country.
