Incident Report

Subject:                     Major Fire at Alon Refinery West Texas - Injures One

Date of Email reporting Incident:   Mon 18/02/2008

Report Detail:

BIG SPRING, Texas – An massive explosion rocked a west Texas oil refinery Monday, shaking buildings several kilometres away and injuring at least one person, a company spokesman said. All workers were accounted for about an hour after the explosion, said Blake Lewis, spokesman for the refinery's owner, Dallas-based Alon USA. The injured worker was in hospital but a report on the worker's condition was not available, Lewis said. Lewis said the cause of the explosion not known but a fire that it sparked had been brought under control. The blast sent black smoke billowing into the sky and shut down a major interstate. "It was extremely scary. You shook you were so scared," said Laura McEwen, wife of Mayor Russ McEwen who lives about three kilometres from the refinery. "Our walls shook. It jolted your bed. It was like an earthquake." John Moseley, managing editor of the Big Spring Herald whose downtown office is also about three kilometres from the refinery, said: "I thought it would knock the walls down." The refinery employs about 170 people and produces about 70,000 barrels a day. Interstate 20 was shut down near the plant, Big Spring police spokesman Roger Sweatt said. "There's some fire and a whole bunch of smoke," Sweatt said.

Big Spring is about halfway between Dallas and El Paso, Tex.