Review - CSB Publishes ITC Tank Farm Fire Final Report

 

Yesterday, the Chemical Safety Board, announced the publication of their final report on the tank farm fire that occurred at the the Intercontinental Terminals Company, LLC (ITC) bulk liquid storage terminal in Deer Park, Texas in March of 2019. The fire resulted in over $150 million in damage to the facility and environmental releases that affected the surrounding community. The report identifies five safety issues that contributed to the severity of the incident and makes eight recommendations to prevent future occurrences of this type.

Commentary

As always, I recommend that anyone interested in chemical safety issues take the time to look at the Simplified Causal Analysis diagram for the incident in Appendix A of the Report.

Rep Garcia (D,TX; Representative for the affected area) announced yesterday that she will be holding a townhall meeting next month with the ‘involved federal agencies’ that will look at the ‘path forward to make the industry safer’. It will be interesting to see which agencies show up. Hopefully, it will include CSB, OSHA and the EPA.

 

For more details on the report, including lists of the safety issues and recommendations, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/csb-publishes-itc-tank-farm-fire - subscription required.