Summary
- No injuries reported from explosion, fire
- Blaze could affect jet fuel supply to LAX, southern California
- No evacuations ordered due to fire
(Reuters) – A massive fire erupted in a jet fuel production unit at Chevron’s El Segundo refinery near Los Angeles on Thursday, sending flames and smoke into the sky and raising questions over supply in California’s isolated energy market.
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No injuries were reported and all workers at the refinery were accounted for, Chevron spokesperson Allison Cook said in an email. Media said the blaze had been contained, though it was still burning early on Friday.
It was not immediately clear what caused the explosion at the facility in the suburb of El Segundo, which supplies jet fuel for Los Angeles International Airport (LAX).
The fire broke out in the refinery’s Isomax 7 unit, which converts mid-distillate fuel oil into jet fuel, two sources said.
It was unclear how it would affect the refinery’s ability to produce jet fuel, and whether wider output had been affected.
Isomax 7 produces jet fuel along with the refinery’s two crude distillation units for LAX airport, located just north of the refinery.
“There is no known impact to LAX at this time,” Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said.
U.S. WTI crude futures prices were trading up 46 cents at $60.94 per barrel by 1011 GMT on Friday, on course for a weekly loss of more than 7% on the week.
The fire is unlikely to have a large impact on the wider oil market, two analysts told Reuters, but California gasoline prices could rise as the state’s fuel market is isolated from other U.S. refining centers in the Midwest and on the Gulf Coast.
Chevron’s second biggest refinery in the United States, the El Segundo facility supplies a fifth of all motor vehicle fuels and 40% of the jet fuel consumed in southern California.
“Chevron fire department personnel, including emergency responders from the cities of El Segundo and Manhattan Beach are actively responding to an isolated fire inside the Chevron El Segundo Refinery,” Cook, the spokesperson, said.
“All refinery personnel and contractors have been accounted for and there are no injuries.”
Local officials said no evacuation orders were issued for nearby residents, some of whom live in apartment buildings across the street from the refinery.
Residents of Manhattan Beach, located southwest of the refinery, were told to shelter in place until 2 a.m.
Los Angeles residents posted numerous videos of the fire online, saying they were stunned by the noise of the blast. A University of California-San Diego camera captured video of the explosion shortly after 9:30 p.m. PDT (0430 GMT).
The fireball when the fire erupted turned the sky orange in the western Los Angeles area as did the refinery’s safety flare, which was set off due to the blaze.
Safety flares, which emit a tall plume of flame, are used when refineries cannot process hydrocarbons normally.
In addition to Chevron, state and federal safety agencies will investigate the fire after the blaze is extinguished, they said.
In December 2022, an isolated fire in the refinery was quickly extinguished.
The refinery’s total storage capacity is 12.5 million barrels in about 150 major tanks. The sources said they were not sure how much jet fuel was currently in storage.
Reporting by Erwin Seba in Houston, Shivani Tanna, Anmol Choubey, Mrinmay Dey in Bengaluru, and Stephanie Kelly in London; Editing by Susan Fenton and Clarence Fernandez
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