At approximately 1:22 p.m. CT on March 27, 2000, an

explosion An explosion is a rapid expansion in volume associated with an extreme outward release of energy, usually with the generation of high temperatures and release of high-pressure gases. Supersonic explosions created by high explosives are known ...

and

fire Fire is the rapid oxidation of a material (the fuel) in the exothermic chemical process of combustion, releasing heat, light, and various reaction Product (chemistry), products. At a certain point in the combustion reaction, called the ignition ...

responsible for one death and 71 injuries occurred at

Phillips Petroleum Phillips Petroleum Company was an American oil company incorporated in 1917 that expanded into petroleum refining, marketing and transportation, natural gas gathering and the chemicals sectors. It was Phillips Petroleum that first found oil in the ...

's Houston Chemical Complex at 1400 Jefferson Road in

Pasadena, Texas Pasadena () is a city in the U.S. state of Texas, within the metropolitan area. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the city's population was 151,950, making it the twentieth most populous city in the state of Texas, as well as the second-largest cit ...

. The fire produced huge plumes of black smoke that spread over the heavily industrialized

Houston Ship Channel The Houston Ship Channel, in Houston, Texas, is part of the Port of Houston, one of the busiest seaports in the world. The channel is the conduit for ocean-going vessels between Houston-area terminals and the Gulf of Mexico, and it serves an incr ...

and neighboring residential areas. The explosion occurred at the K-Resin facility, which made

styrene-butadiene Styrene-butadiene or styrene-butadiene rubber (SBR) describe families of synthetic rubbers derived from styrene and butadiene (the version developed by Goodyear is called Neolite). These materials have good abrasion resistance and good aging st ...

, a type of synthetic rubber. At the time of the explosion, the tank was out of service for cleaning and had no pressure or temperature gauges that would have provided the workers with an alert to the approaching crisis. Ultimately, this explosion resulted in one fatality, while 32

employees and 39 subcontractors were taken to local hospitals for sustaining burns, smoke inhalation, and cuts from debris. It took search crews five hours to locate the body of a missing employee in the rubble. The dead man was Rodney Gott, a 45-year-old supervisor, who barely survived the Phillips Disaster of 1989. At that time, Gott was in a building whose roof collapsed but he remained in the blazing plant to save a woman and attend to the injured. The

Occupational Safety and Health Administration The Occupational Safety and Health Administration'' (OSHA ) is a large regulatory agency of the United States Department of Labor that originally had federal visitorial powers to inspect and examine workplaces. Congress established the agenc ...

's six-month investigation concluded that failure to train workers properly was a key factor in the explosion and fire, and it proposed that

be fined $2.5 million in penalties for 50 alleged violations of safety standards at the facility.

Facility today

The facility continued to manufacture

high-density polyethylene High-density polyethylene (HDPE) or polyethylene high-density (PEHD) is a thermoplastic polymer produced from the monomer ethylene. It is sometimes called "alkathene" or "polythene" when used for HDPE pipes. With a high strength-to-density ratio, ...

(HDPE), as well as

polypropylene Polypropylene (PP), also known as polypropene, is a thermoplastic polymer used in a wide variety of applications. It is produced via chain-growth polymerization from the monomer propylene. Polypropylene belongs to the group of polyolefins and ...

and K-Resin SBC until 2011. This complex employs 750 workers for the production of

specialty chemicals Speciality chemicals (also called specialties or effect chemicals) are particular chemical products which provide a wide variety of effects on which many other industry sectors rely. Some of the categories of speciality chemicals are adhesives, agr ...

, including 150 operations and maintenance personnel. The facility also experienced fatalities in 1989 and

1999 File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school shootin ...

. Today the facility only manufactures polyethylene.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Phillips explosion Explosions in 2000 2000 disasters in the United States 2000 in Texas 2000 industrial disasters Disasters in Texas Explosions in the United States Fires in Texas Industrial fires and explosions in the United States Phillips 66 Urban fires in the United States March 2000 events in the United States

Facility today

See also

References