Explosions in Hemel Hampstead, UK!

Explosions in Hemel Hempstead, UK!

Holy crap, that was fuggin loud! An oil depot near Hemel Hempstead just went up in flames at 6am, with two smaller explosions 20 mins later.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4517962.stm

I live about 5 miles away in St Albans and was woken up when the house shook at 6am. Wow, a week ago I used to work at a place that's a few hundred yards from the oil depot. I bet the glass fronted building will be fairly open-plan by now!

Near/in London? I think I read a quip about that on the law board about an hour or so ago... they didn't have any details, but it was supposedly on CNN.

Apparently, it's one of the biggest petrol storage facilities in the south/south east of England. Houses up to 2 miles away have had windows blown in. Houses nearby have had doors blown in and one place had it's roof cave in. The blast was so big it was heard up to 15 miles away in central London.

There are 20 storage tanks, each holding up to 3 million gallons/litres of petrol and reports say 5 of them went up.

It's the Buncefield depot in Hemel Hempstead, which is about 15 miles north of London, where the M25 circular motorway (around London) joins the M1 north-south motorway out of London.

Damn... looks like a pretty big thing. Post up if you hear any reports or rumors as to the cause. I'm sure it's way to early for anything like that right now.

All I got from the law board was :

LONDON UNDER ATTACK!

Date: December 11th, 2005 2:10 AM
Author: Det. Mahmoud al-Rami Shukrijumah

OH NO ITS THE LUFTWAFFE!

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Date: December 11th, 2005 2:44 AM
Author: MachoBreeze (NCAA basketball needs contraction)

probably just some industrial accident

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Date: December 11th, 2005 3:06 AM
Author: OregonDuck

Yep, a fuel depot.

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Date: December 11th, 2005 3:01 AM
Author: Caesar

Check CNN.

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Date: December 11th, 2005 3:07 AM
Author: The Date Doctor

HOLY SHIT!


Do they know if it was terrorism?

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Date: December 11th, 2005 3:08 AM
Author: The Date Doctor

London Police claiming it was an accident (according to CNN)

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http://www.xoxohth.com/thread.php?thread_id=317015&mc=6&forum_id=2

I guess that last post answeres my question, lol.

Okay, I know the college/law boards over there have ten times the joke/parody threads of EF here, but someone posted

ELVIS GRBAC KILLED IN LONDON ATTACK

Apparently he swerved his car to avoid the blast

No idea who that is, but just thought I'd throw that info over here.

No, there are no confirmed casualties at present. There would have been about a dozen staff on site at that time in the morning.

The M1 motorway has been closed in both directions. It's about 1/4 mile away from the depot and one person who was driving on it at the time said after seeing the explosion, some debris rained down on them.

An early report said a plane crashed into the site, but there's always someone who's going to say that these days. That's since been denied by the police. Luton airport is about 12 miles away and services are so far unaffected.

Apparently, it was heard up to 40 miles away!

30 people were injuried in the blast, none dead thankfully

The lastest from sky news:



Breaking News
Smoke and flames at the site Explosion At Fuel Depot
Updated: 13:37, Sunday December 11, 2005
Some 39 people have been injured in a huge explosion at a fuel depot. The blast was so powerful it rocked houses up to 40 miles away and was heard in Holland.

One of the injured is seriously hurt and another person is under observation in hospital.

"Tongues of flames" are continuing to soar hundreds of feet into the sky and an acrid cloud of smoke is stretching for miles from the depot and moving south-eastwards.

The Army is on standby and people anywhere near the area or close to the plume of smoke are being warned to stay inside and close all windows and doors. Authorities in the region have been handing out breathing masks.

The blast happened at the Buncefield depot near Hemel Hempstead, around 25 miles north of London, just after 6am.

Police have said that although the situation is now under control, they expect more blasts at the site, which stores 16 million litres of petrol, kerosene and diesel.


A picture sent to Sky News by a viewer And experts have said that in this type of situation fire crews can only cut off the fuel supply and wait for the fire to burn out.

Police have urged people not to panic-buy petrol. They say contingency plans are in place and there is "nothing to suggest" there will be a supply problem.

Houses near the depot have been evacuated and the M1 has been closed in both directions. The smoke is beginning to obscure main roads, including the M40, reports say.

The cause of the explosion is not yet known but no third party - a plane or a terrorist - was involved.

Thousands of viewers are contacting Sky News with reports it shook houses many miles away.

Witnesses have said that buildings have been brought down and the roofs of houses were lifted by the force.

One witness said he was near the site when the blast happened and he saw a building "open up like a doll's house".


Map of the area Sky Reporter Enda Brady is at the scene. He said there has been a lot of structural damage to surrounding buildings.

"As for residential buildings, it would appear that most people have got away with just blown out windows and cracks," he said.

Brady said he can see a "colossal column of thick black acrid smoke". He added: "People are very, very shocked. Many are walking around in their bed clothes."

Sky News Correspondent Geoff Meade heard the blast at his home.

He immediately called Sky Centre in west London, which was also shook by the explosion, and described "burning tongues" of flames in the sky.

The first blast happened at about 6.03am - it was followed by several smaller explosions.

Sky News producer Anwar Tambe heard the blast from his home in Luton and later became stuck in traffic on the M1. The motorway will remain closed for hours to come.

He said blasts were "going off regularly" and debris has blown onto the motorway.