Incident Report

Subject:            Bulgaria – BLEVE injures 11 including 7 Fire-fighters       

Date of Email report:   Wed 21/08/2013

Report Detail:

The head of the fire-fighting department of the Bulgarian Interior Ministry, Nikolai Nikolov, said on August 15 that carelessness was the most likely cause of the gas tanker wagon explosion near the Bulgarian city of Varna.   Nikolov said that the most likely cause of the explosion was a gas leak, itself the result of a ruptured hose during the process of moving the gas from the tanker wagon into a tanker lorry. Investigators were still trying to establish what actually happened, he told reporters, as quoted by Focus news agency.

Eleven people were injured in the blast, which happened at the Ezerovo railway station, about 10km west of Varna, and the fire that followed the explosion. The number included seven fire-fighters; the rest were bystanders who were working in a nearby warehouse. Two people were still in intensive care, including one man with extensive burns that covered 90 per cent of his body.  Fire fighters from Varna’s thermal power plant were the first on the scene, followed by teams from the Varna fire department and the Varna Airport, Nikolov said. The fire was finally extinguished late on August 14.

Two of the victims who suffered serious burns in the Ezerovo gas tank explosion remain in intensive care, Director of the Military Medical Academy Stoyan Tonev told Nova TV. Another seven people are also still hospitalized, but are not in intensive care. The man who suffered 90% burns is in very severe condition. A prognosis in his case would be very difficult, Tonev said adding that the other seven injured in the fire are already recovering. Doctors have already begun with their plastic operations.

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