West Fertilizer Company Told the EPA Its Worst-Case Scenario Was a Small Ammonia Leak, No Fire or Explosion. Fifteen People, Mostly Volunteer Firefighters, Died Proving It Wrong Twenty Minutes Later.

West Fertilizer Company had been mixing and storing agricultural chemicals in the small Texas town of West, population roughly 2,800, since 1962. On the evening of April 17, 2013, a fire broke out inside the wood-frame facility. Firefighters, most of them volunteers, arrived to fight what looked like a routine structure fire. Twenty minutes later, the building detonated with a force that registered as a magnitude-2.1 earthquake.

The plant was storing up to 270 tons — 540,000 pounds — of ammonium nitrate, the same compound used in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, according to a filing the company itself made with a state agency in February 2013. The federal threshold requiring notification to the Department of Homeland Security is 400 pounds. West Fertilizer was holding roughly 1,350 times that amount and had never told DHS it was there.

The Paperwork

Every high-risk chemical facility is required to file a worst-case release scenario with the EPA. West Fertilizer's filing described a possible ammonia leak. It listed no risk of fire. It listed no risk of explosion. The document that was supposed to warn first responders what they might be walking into told them, in effect, that there was nothing to worry about.

• The plant's own EPA risk management filing claimed only an ammonia leak was possible — no fire or explosion scenario was disclosed.
• DHS was never notified of the 540,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate on site, despite the amount exceeding the mandatory reporting threshold by roughly 1,350 times.
• Anhydrous ammonia storage tanks at the facility were found in 2006 to be operating without a required permit.

The Inspection Gap

Federal oversight of the plant had effectively stopped decades before the explosion. OSHA had not conducted a full inspection of the facility since 1985 — nearly 28 years. A partial inspection in 2011 found the plant lacked a safety plan for its ammonia canisters. The fine for that violation was $5,250.

• Last full OSHA inspection: 1985.
• 2011 partial inspection: one violation found, fine of $5,250.
• No fire sprinklers installed in the wood-frame structure.
• No formal preincident fire plan existed for the facility.

The Night Of

The fire was reported around 7:30 p.m. Volunteer and career firefighters converged on the scene, treating it as a standard structure fire — because that was the only kind of incident the plant's own records suggested was possible. Around 7:51 p.m., roughly twenty minutes after the first call, the ammonium nitrate detonated.

• 15 people were killed: 10 first responders (firefighters and EMS personnel, including four volunteers from neighboring departments who happened to be in town for an EMS class that night, plus one off-duty Dallas fire captain), 2 civilian support volunteers, and 3 nearby residents.
• Estimates of the injured range from 160 to more than 260.
• Roughly 150 buildings were destroyed or damaged, including a 50-unit apartment complex that was destroyed, West Middle School, a nursing home, and an ambulance station.
• The blast left a crater 93 feet wide and 10 feet deep.

The Investigation

The cause of the fire itself took years to determine. In May 2016, after more than 400 interviews, the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives ruled that the fire had been intentionally set. A $50,000 reward was offered for information leading to an arrest.

• ATF classification, May 2016: arson.
• Reward offered: $50,000.
• Arrests made as of the ATF's ruling and in the years since: none.

The Response

The explosion prompted federal and state action, though the pace and durability of that action varied. President Obama signed Executive Order 13650 on chemical facility safety in August 2013. The EPA finalized amendments to its Risk Management Program in January 2017, tightening rules on facilities like West Fertilizer — and those amendments were then delayed and rolled back under the incoming administration. Texas moved on its own, passing HB 942 in 2015 to give the state fire marshal new authority to regulate ammonium nitrate storage.

• August 2013: Executive Order 13650 signed, directing federal review of chemical facility safety.
• January 2017: EPA Risk Management Program amendments finalized.
• 2017: those amendments delayed, then rolled back, under the new administration.
• 2015: Texas HB 942 gives the state fire marshal authority over ammonium nitrate storage.

The firefighters who died at West that night were not reckless, and they were not uninformed. They followed the information the plant had put on record. The plant's own filing to the EPA said the worst thing that could happen there was an ammonia leak — no fire, no explosion, nothing that would require anyone to stay back. It took twenty minutes for the ammonium nitrate the filing didn't mention to prove otherwise.

Filed from public reporting:

• Wikipedia — "West Fertilizer Company explosion"
• ProPublica — "What Went Wrong in West, Texas — and Where Were the Regulators?"
• U.S. Chemical Safety Board — "Final Investigation Report" (PDF)
• NBC News — "Texas plant had 1,350 times the amount of chemical that would trigger oversight"
• NPR — "Deadly Texas Fertilizer Plant Fire Was Intentionally Set, Authorities Say"
• NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth — "4 Years Later: No Suspects, Arrests in West Explosion"
• FireRescue1 — "West, Texas: The fertilizer plant explosion that killed 10 firefighters"
• EPA — "Executive Order on Improving Chemical Facility Safety and Security"
• Texas Lawbook — "From West, Texas, to Washington, DC"
• Confined Space (Jordan Barab) — "The West Fertilizer Explosion Ten Years Later"