On October 18, 1994, the normally placid Cedar Bayou waterway overflowed and flooded much of Baytown, Texas. In just over two days, 30 inches or 76.2 centimeters of rain fell on the bayou's watershed and the Cedar Bayou was flooded. When the rain runoff began spilling into the plant's electrical substation, the facility lost all outside electrical power forcing operators to shut down most process units. Employees watched temporary barriers fail and control rooms, warehouses, and offices become submerged.
HISTORY
Cedar Bayou plant is a petrochemical manufacturing facility located in Baytown, Texas. It is the largest U.S. manufacturing facility of Chevron Phillips Chemical Company. The plant operates seven process units on approximately 1,400 acres producing Ethylene, Propylene, Normal Alpha Olefins (NAO), High Density Polyethylene (HDPE), Low Density Polyethylene (LDPE), Linear Low-Density Polyethylene (LLDPE), and Polyalphaolefins. Cedar Bayou plant opened in 1963 as Gulf Oil and was sold to Chevron Corp. in 1985. In 2000, Chevron Corp. and Phillips 66 merged their chemical businesses to form Chevron Phillips Chemical Company.
Cedar Bayou plant employs approximately 800 employees and 1,200 nested contractors.
EVENT
On October 18, 1994, the normally placid Cedar Bayou waterway overflowed and flooded much of Baytown, Texas. In just over two days, 30 inches or 76.2 centimeters of rain fell on the bayou's watershed and the Cedar Bayou was flooded. When the rain runoff began spilling into the plant's electrical substation, the facility lost all outside electrical power forcing operators to shut down most process units. Employees watched temporary barriers fail and control rooms, warehouses, and offices become submerged. In a Baytown Sun newspaper interview shortly after, then-plant Manager Larry Lucchesi said it was the worst disaster to strike the plant in its 32 years.
Plant employees such as myself spent 45 hours at the plant as egress was impossible due to the flood waters. As a process operator and emergency response member I was tasked with the safe shutdown of our polyethylene unit. Fortunately, our unit has the highest elevation in the plant, thus only 6 inches of water covered our unit. Our control room was the newest building (elevated) in the plant and did not incur water intrusion or damage.
Movement inside the plant during the peak of the flooding was with the use of a industrial front-end loader. This allowed for much-needed supplies such as food and water to be delivered to our employees and contractors.
Our control room was designated as the plant’s Emergency Operations Center (EOC). All plant emergency vehicles were safely moved to higher ground around the EOC.
“A Process Hazard Anal ysis (PHA) provides information intended to assist managers and employees in making decisions for improving safety and reducing the consequences of unwanted or unplanned releases of hazardous materials."
HAZARDS
In one of the largest accidental releases, Chevron Phillips Chemical reported that it may have released more than 745,000 pounds of contaminants into the air as it shut down its Cedar Bayou Plant in Baytown, Texas.
With nearly 75% of the facility covered by water the hazards we encountered were:
Floating hydrocarbons from oily sewer pits
Floating debris
Poisonous snakes
Floating Fire Ant mounds
Alligators
RECOVERY
After the flood waters receded clean-up and repair operations began. The facility completed all work within a 6-week time frame and successfully resumed operations.
Since the flood new control rooms have been built, administration building relocated, and preventive measures to prevent devastating flood damages in the future.
San Jacinto River on Fire
ABOUT
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 increasing volume of inland barge traffic. Wikipedia
Bridges: Sam Houston Ship Channel Bridge, Fred Hartman Bridge, Sidney Sherman Bridge
Start point: Port of Houston
End point: Gulf of Mexico
Length: 50 miles (80 km)
EVENT
From October 13 to 19,1994, remnants of Hurricane Rosa brought significant rainfall to southeast Texas. The rainfall resulted in severe flooding of residential areas as well as a dramatic rise in the San Jacinto River.
In addition, the rapid rise of the river created hazardous navigational conditions for vessels transiting the Houston Ship Channel because the normally peaceful waterway approached speeds over ten knots. During the first 36 hours of operation, "Team Coast Guard" rescued 584 persons from the flood-swollen areas.
Hazardous conditions included 37 runaway barges, a severely damaged railroad bridge, several sunken vessels, downed power lines, and multiple oil spills and hazardous materials incidents. As a result of these hazards, the Captain of the Port of Houston established a safety zone and closed the port to vessel traffic. At 9:51 A.M. on October 20, 1994, there was a massive explosion on the San Jacinto River. At least one major pipeline ruptured and in three minutes most of the lower San Jacinto River erupted in flames. This fuel-fed conflagration would eventually consume several boats, a barge, and more than 20 buildings. By midafternoon, four major pipelines had ruptured, spilling gasoline, fuel oil, crude oil, and natural gas into the river—a potential spill of 432,000 barrels.
RESPONSE
At the height of operations, the FOSC directed more than 1500 response personnel. Effective management of so many personnel was possible through the use of the National Interagency Incident Management System (NIIMS). Local response personnel (federal, state, and contractor) were familiar with NIIMS, as defined in the Galveston Bay Area Contingency Plan and through numerous exercises. Personnel from MSO Houston served in each of the four functional areas as either section chief or deputy section chief. This permitted continuity and local area knowledge within each section as the organization expanded or downsized. The operations section was divided into three branches: cleanup, emergency response, and air operations. These branches were further subdivided into 11 divisions or groups. This division of labor ensured that personnel and resources were employed in the most effective manner to eliminate hazards and mitigate the spill. The five divisions of the cleanup branch conducted oil spill recovery operations along the San Jacinto River and upper Galveston Bay. The emergency response branch had four groups responsible for safety zone enforcement, search and rescue, fire suppression, and hazardous mate rials response. The air operations branch was divided into an air tactical group and an air support group.
The NIIMS organizational model was so effective during this incident that the Coast Guard and the Texas General Land Office have since adopted it for use in responding to pollution incidents. The NIIMS model has been successfully used in the Houston-Galveston area in at least five major incidents in 1996.
CLEANUP
Due to the severity of the emergency, the federal on-scene coordinator (FOSC) established a federal cleanup project. Final costs for this emergency would eventually rise to $8 million.
コメント