Ground shakes and Mexico gas pipeline explodes
Esteban Vazquez Huerta felt the ground suddenly shake as he worked on pipes at a natural gas plant near the U.S. border, then a pipeline just 300 yards away exploded in boiling flames higher than a three-story home.
Two workers rushed past him fleeing the blaze, and Vazquez sprinted after them only to be knocked to the ground by a second blast, he recalled Wednesday. He scrambled back to his feet and scaled a wall to escape the inferno that killed at least 29 and injured 46 fellow workers.
Officials from the state-owned company Petroleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, said that an "accidental leak" appeared to have caused Tuesday's deadly blasts and that there were no signs so far of sabotage. Four Pemex workers ranging in age from 28 to 44 were among the dead, and the rest were reported to be employees of contractors.
The facility's perimeter walls, topped with razor wire as a security measure in a country that has seen thieves, saboteurs and drug gangs target oil installations, presented an obstacle for Vazquez and other workers as they fled.
"We had to climb the wall from that side because the fire, the heat was reaching us," Vazquez said as he stood outside the plant waiting for word of missing co-workers.
Until the final moments before the explosion there was no sign anything was wrong, said Vazquez, a worker for contracting firm IANSA. He said the ground shook under him and then the fire erupted.
Outside the regional federal prosecutor's office, local funeral home workers paced the shade-less sidewalk through the afternoon. Inside, family members tried to identify husbands, brothers and sons from photographs of remains. Some relatives emerged from the high-walled compound with tear-filled eyes to be embraced by family. Others left without being able to identify a loved one, instead leaving a blood sample in hopes of making a DNA match.
