Last night, an incident at the Martinez Refinery injured one worker. The fire that led to the injury happened around 7:50 p.m. during a routine refueling of a portable air compressor by a contract worker, as reported by KRON4. As expressed by the Martinez Refining Company and the City of Martinez's Instagram page, the fire was quickly extinguished and deemed unrelated to any of the refinery's process units.
The fire occurred just two months after a larger blaze at the same facility, which resulted in multiple injuries and shelter-in-place orders. Contra Costa Health's Hazmat team responded to the scene at approximately 8:20 p.m., with Contra Costa Health officials later requesting that the Martinez Refinery Company submit a report on the incident within 72 hours, according to KTVU. The restart of other refinery processes not involved in the previous incident began yesterday and is expected to last about two weeks.
The exact nature of the injuries suffered by the worker has not been made public, nor have potential health or environmental impacts to the surrounding community from the recent fire. The Martinez Refinery Company has highlighted its diligence in minimizing flaring, stating, "We are working diligently to minimize flaring and will only flare if necessary for safety and reliability reasons," as noted in the KTVU report.
