"Marathon Petroleum said a massive fire at its Louisiana refinery caused ‘no offsite impacts’. Reporting by the Guardian and Forensic Architecture raised doubts about this claim"
"Oil giant Marathon Petroleum is fighting an expanded class-action lawsuit fueled by an investigation by the Guardian and Forensic Architecture, which examined a huge toxic blaze at the company’s sprawling refinery in south-east Louisiana in 2023.
Parts of the oil refinery, the third largest in America, caught fire for over three days in August 2023 after a large storage tank containing the toxic and flammable hydrocarbon naphtha leaked for more than 13 hours unbeknown to the predominantly Black low-income communities that surround the facility.
The incident resulted in one of the largest flammable chemical releases recorded by the Environmental Protection Agency’s risk management program, which monitors accidents at thousands of facilities across the country that store extremely hazardous materials."
Oliver Laughland and Sara Sneath report for the Guardian January 27, 2025.
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