HUNTINGTON, Ind. (Indiana's NewsCenter) – Emergency responders are cleaning up a massive diesel fuel spill.
Fire officials say 100,0000 gallons of diesel fuel were lost at the Gladieux refinery late Wednesday night into Thursday morning.
Gladieux Vice President and Director of Environmental Affairs, Rasik Raval, says an employee was transferring the fuel from one massive tank to another. Each tank can hold about two million gallons of fuel. Raval says the employee forgot to shut off the transfer pump and went home. Just before 6:00 a.m. another employee noticed the spill and called the fire department.
“When they were first called out they were responding to a spill,” Huntington Fire Chief Matthew Armstrong said. “We didn’t know what type of spill it might be at the time. We got out here and found out that it was one of their big tanks. And it was a new experience for us.”
Officials with the Emergency Management Agency, Indiana Department of Environmental Management, Environmental Resource Associates, Red Cross, and other emergency management agencies tried to contain the spill.
Armstrong says the dike surrounding the tank held all of the fuel and they were able to keep it contained in that area.
Fire officials are monitoring the air and water for any toxic changes. Armstrong says neighbors and employees should not be concerned about health problems.
“We don’t have any explosive level in the air and everything is pretty much contained right here on their property,” Armstrong said.
This is the first time in Gladieux’s 23-year history in Huntington that a spill has happened.
Armstrong says he hopes to have the majority of the fuel off the ground by 6:00 p.m. Thursday. Raval says environmental crews will then test the soil and find out what they will need to do to repair the saturated ground.
Raval would not say if the employee would be punished or fired. He says there will be an investigation into the incident.
The refinery continued to operate while crews clean up.
Gladieux employs 84 people in Huntington. They export about 400,000 gallons of gasoline and diesel fuel to Midwest companies a day. The company was created in 1947.
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