05:43 PM CDT on Thursday, July 28, 2005

Associated Press

FORT WORTH -- A series of explosions rocked a chemical plant Thursday, injuring at least three people and sparking a fire big enough that its black cloud could be seen 30 miles away in Dallas.

WFAA

Smoke from the huge fire could be seen as far as 30 miles away.

“It shook all the buildings here,” Angela McCollum, who works at a cement plant about 100 yards away, told The Dallas Morning News. “All I can see is just tons of fire and tons of smoke, and it’s really kind of scary.”

Workers at the Valley Solvents & Chemicals plant told authorities they heard an explosion and then noticed a fire near a tractor-trailer that had just pulled into the plant to deliver chemicals, said Lt. Kent Worley with the Fort Worth Fire Department.

The driver suffered a burned leg, one employee burned an arm and another injured his back trying to flee the scene, Worley said. None of the injuries were believed to be critical, he said.

Firefighters continued to battle the blaze about three hours after the blast, and the fire had diminished by late afternoon.

They initially couldn’t get very close because of the dangerous chemicals, Worley said. The fire raged in and around more than a dozen large metal and plastic tanks that contained 2,000 to 4,000 gallons of methanol, sulfuric acid, hydrochloric acid, ethanol and other chemicals.

Marsha Anderson, a Fort Worth public information officer, told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram there were no plans for evacuations.

The Environmental Protection Agency has sent an official to the scene with air monitoring equipment to provide information to local officials, said Cynthia Fanning, a spokeswoman for the EPA in Dallas.

Valley Solvents officials didn’t immediately return phone calls seeking comment.

According to the company’s Web site, Valley Solvents & Chemicals is a South Texas-based chemical distributor to companies in Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Louisiana, and Northern Mexico. Besides Fort Worth, Valley Solvents operates offices in Harlingen and Corpus Christi.

Authorities routed traffic off of Interstate 35 near the plant as a precaution.

No further injuries were expected because the fire is in a large industrial area not close to any residential neighborhoods, and all the company’s employees have been accounted for, Worley said.