Page 101 - FINAL Phillips 66 50 Year Book

At 2.20pm on Easter Monday, 2001, an explosion and fire occurred at
the refinery. It was heard several miles away and shattered windows in
some homes and buildings in the surrounding community. The most
severe damage was in the saturate gas plant, where the explosion
occurred, and in a heater serving part of the petroleum coke facilities.
Thankfully, as it was a bank holiday and minimum staff on duty, only two
people suffered minor injuries. It was also fortunate that it happened
near a shift change; this doubled the amount of resources available to
handle the situation. The refinery’s own firefighting staff did a superb
job of bringing the fire under control, with support from neighbouring
Lindsey Oil Refinery and the local fire brigade.

The front line, in fact, was occupied by a handful of shift operators.
Even before firefighters arrived they had taken rapid action – in the face
of great potential danger – to limit the effects of the explosion which
destroyed the saturate gas plant. They closed off 40 valves and cut off
the process flows to the plant, which could have dramatically increased
the size and impact of the fire. Bob Pike, then field leader on white
oils, who led the team, said: “I was in the control room when there was
an enormous bang. The ceiling fell in, the doors flew open and we all
dropped to the floor. After putting on safety gear I went outside to be
confronted by a ball of fire. Together with the shift operators, I quickly
assessed where the problem areas were and we set out to turn off the
valves and isolate the fire.”

First into the breach were Nigel Mussett, Bill Hill, Karl Bethell, Jason
Moore and Neil Ellis. “I don’t think any of us were scared,” said Bob.
“We just went into automatic pilot and did the things we had been
trained for. The adrenaline kept us going. Some of the pipes were still
feeding the fire and it became clear that we had to get closer to the seat
of the fire to close them down.