At least 18 injured in fire at Venezuela’s La Salina oil terminal, sources say

By Mircely Guanipa and Mariela Nava

MARACAIBO (Reuters) -At least 18 people including workers, neighbors and firefighters were reported injured on Tuesday in a fire at a crude storage tank in Venezuela’s La Salina oil terminal, sources with knowledge of the facility’s operations said.

The fire broke out early in the day during a storm and has been raging through the afternoon. The facility, which is operated by state oil company PDVSA mostly for domestic use, is located near the western city of Cabimas on the shore of Lake Maracaibo.

“They are calculating 18 people injured including firefighters from Cabimas, PDVSA (workers) and also locals,” one of the sources said.

PDVSA did not reply to a request for comment.

Fires, power outages and other incidents are common at PDVSA’s facilities due to the deterioration of oil production sites, refineries, terminals, pipelines and vessels. They frequently disrupt operations.

Firefighters from Cabimas said earlier on Tuesday they were working to control and smother the balls of fire, which were leaving a tall plume of black smoke. Foam applied to extinguish this type of oil-related fires was being used, according to the sources and videos seen by Reuters.

The tank had about 75,000 barrels of oil when the fire broke out at the terminal’s storage patio, the chief of the Cabimas’ firefighters, Mufid Houmeidan, said in a video, adding that nearby communities would not need to be evacuated.

The tank’s structure was seen collapsing in several videos, as people were standing close to it. An explosion was heard by neighbors later, two of the sources said, followed by a taller column of fire.

“There was a boil over,” another source said. “That’s what you see in the videos.”

Injured people, including chief Houmeidan, were taken to a PDVSA hospital in the area, the sources said.

The nearby Bajo Grande terminal, used by PDVSA and U.S. producer Chevron to export crude and fuel, was unaffected by the incident, sources close to operations said.

(Reporting by Mircely Guanipa, Mariela Nava, Tibisay Romero and Deisy Buitrago; writing by Marianna Parraga; Editing by Sandra Maler)