On Tuesday afternoon, a huge fire broke out at the Haldia Petrochemicals factory in Haldia, West Bengal’s East Midnapore district.
The chemical factory’s internal fire system has been activated, but the fire has yet to be extinguished over two hours after it was discovered. The plant’s officials, on the other hand, have promised that no one is stuck inside and that there is a very low risk of casualties.
Officials of Haldia Petrochemicals say there is a possibility that some residual chemical was lying in the pipeline which caused the fire. The plant’s internal firefighting system has been pressed into action and help has been sought from the other factories in the nearby locality. In a similar incident, in September 2019 a major fire broke out at the Naphtha cracker unit of the the plant, injuring 15 people.
Haldia Petrochemicals Ltd. is one of the largest petrochemical companies in India, with a total capacity equivalent to 10,00,000 TPA of ethylene. It was formed out of a joint venture between the Government of West Bengal, The Chatterjee Group, TATA Group and Indian Oil Corporation in 1994. Its main products are Linear Low-Density Polyethylene (LLDPE) and Benzene, Butadiene, Cyclopentane, C4 Hydrogenated (LPG), Pyrolysis Gasoline (Py Gas) and Carbon Black Feedstock (CBFS)
