Investigators still waiting to examine refinery explosion

An explosion at a refinery rocked the city and beyond on Christmas Eve, and fortunately, no one was injured in Regina on Tuesday, Dec. 24, 2013.

Regina fire investigators are still waiting for the go-ahead from Federated Co-op refinery engineers to start examining what caused an explosion at the plant Christmas Eve.

The boom was heard and felt across the city around 3 p.m. Tuesday.

Co-op officials said the explosion happened in a large tank in a propane-butane processing unit.

An on-scene fire suppression unit contained the fire.

Co-op officials said they’re taking the incident very seriously.

“We’ve got a lot of processes in place, as any refinery should, but one [incident] is too many, and we’ve had a few,” said Dan McMurtry, the refinery’s vice-president of systems strategy.

The explosion was the fourth major fire at the refinery in the last two years.

In February, a fire in a coker unit sent flames shooting nearly 20 metres in the air, but was quickly brought under control.

In October 2011, corrosion in a pipe triggered a fireball that sent seven contract workers to hospital and forced 1,400 workers from the facility.

In May 2012, a much smaller fire occurred when an overheated crude oil pump ignited. There were no injuries.