A 900,000-gallon chemical tank ruptured at a pulp and paper mill in Longview, Washington, on Tuesday morning, killing at least two workers, leaving nine others missing and presumed dead, and sending a corrosive chemical spewing across the facility in what the governor called potentially the deadliest industrial disaster in modern state history.
The blast at Nippon Dynawave Packaging struck at approximately 7:15 a.m. on May 26, right during a shift change, when workers were moving through the facility. By Wednesday morning, fire officials had abandoned any hope of rescue and shifted to recovery operations. A second worker died in the hospital on Wednesday, ABC News reported, bringing the confirmed death toll to two.
Nine employees remain unaccounted for. Seven more were hospitalized with chemical burns. One firefighter was injured, treated, and released. The facility employs roughly 1,000 people in a city of 38,000, about 50 miles northwest of Portland, along the Columbia River near the Washington-Oregon border.
The tank contained white liquor, a corrosive chemical mixture of sodium hydroxide, sodium sulfide, and disodium carbonate used in kraft paper production. Cowlitz 2 Fire & Rescue Chief Scott Goldstein described the aftermath in blunt terms at a Wednesday press briefing:
"There was a rupture, a failure, a blast. All of those to us mean the same. It's not why it happened, it's the damage that we observe. Vehicles are damaged, buildings are damaged, mechanical equipment is damaged, collapsed and failed."
The tank was approximately 60 percent full at the time of the rupture. A joint statement from local authorities and Nippon Dynawave said the remaining product in the damaged tank, roughly 25,000 gallons, was a "significantly smaller volume" than initially believed, allowing emergency responders to develop a plan to remove it. That figure represents less than three percent of the tank's total capacity.
Newsmax reported that the scene was classified as a mass casualty incident requiring extensive emergency response, with injuries ranging from minor to critical. Chief Goldstein told reporters the department had information on the number of missing workers but was withholding it during the early hours of the response.
By Wednesday, officials made clear that recovery, not rescue, was the mission. Goldstein told reporters there was no expectation of finding survivors among the nine missing.
The Associated Press reported that some of the nine additional people injured suffered burns or inhalation injuries, and that the facility had prior safety violations, though authorities said the cause of the implosion remained unclear.
Longview Fire Battalion Chief Matt Amos described the approach to the site:
"The priority is ensuring responder safety while treating every victim with the greatest dignity, care, and respect as possible."
Safety concerns over the unstable tank slowed the recovery effort, which Goldstein called "slow, methodical and deliberate." Authorities said they had not found any video recording of the incident.
One of the two confirmed dead was identified as Gilbert Bernal, a husband, father, and grandfather. His daughter, Geovana Bernal, confirmed his death with the Cowlitz County Coroner's Office and spoke to ABC News.
"My father was the most selfless man I knew. He worked hard to provide for his family and he loved us so much."
The identity of the second deceased worker, the employee who died in the hospital on Wednesday, has not been released. The Cowlitz County Coroner's Office said it would release names only after all individuals had been recovered and family notifications were complete.
Crystal Moldenhauer, a Longview resident, captured the community's grief in remarks to the AP: "There's families that been torn apart, and we don't know why."
The chemical release was not confined to the mill grounds. White liquor contamination entered the Columbia River and was found in ditches near the facility. Officials said contaminated water in the ditch system was being flushed to draw it away from residential areas and the city's water supply.
Authorities stated Wednesday that there were no negative health impacts to air quality or Longview's drinking water system. But the language was cautious: there was "no concern" that drinking water supplies had been impacted yet, though "the longer the contaminated water remains in the ditch system, the greater the potential for it to contaminate the underlying aquifer."
The public was told to keep away from ditches and dikes while water testing continued. The Washington State Department of Ecology and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency were monitoring air and water quality.
The U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board opened a formal investigation into the rupture and dispatched a team of investigators to the site on Wednesday. The Washington State Department of Labor and Industries also launched its own investigation.
No cause has been identified. Breitbart reported that officials repeatedly referred to the situation as a recovery effort, with approximately 90,000 gallons of the corrosive chemical still in the damaged tank at the time of their initial reporting, a figure that was later revised downward in the joint statement to roughly 25,000 gallons.
Brian Wood, Nippon Dynawave's director of support services, spoke at Wednesday's briefing:
"On behalf of NDP, these are our people. We are focused on our people. We are focused on helping our responders find and recover those things. That is our people. That is our focus today."
Wood said the company was cooperating fully with investigators.
Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson held a press briefing Wednesday and did not mince words about the scale of the disaster. Fox News reported on the incident as the scope of the catastrophe became clear.
"We're bracing ourselves for this being the deadliest industrial tragedy in modern Washington state history."
Ferguson extended condolences to the families affected, saying the impacts on individuals, families, and the broader community were "profound."
Chief Goldstein acknowledged the toll on the responders themselves, many of whom knew the missing and the dead personally:
"Understand that there are members working the site tirelessly that have lost coworkers, lost friends, and they remain dedicated to focusing on our recovery efforts."
The most pressing question, why a massive chemical tank at a major industrial facility failed catastrophically on a Tuesday morning, has no answer yet. The cause is unknown. No video of the rupture has been located. The facility's prior safety record has not been detailed by investigators. The names of the nine missing workers have not been made public.
What is known is this: a 900,000-gallon tank full of caustic chemicals gave way without warning at a plant where a thousand people report to work, during a shift change when employees were in their workspaces. Two are dead. Nine are missing with no hope of rescue. Seven more lie in hospital beds with chemical burns. And a community of 38,000 people is waiting for answers that may take months to come.
When workers clock in at an American industrial facility, they should be able to expect that the equipment around them won't fail in a way that leaves their families planning funerals. The investigations now underway owe those families, and every worker at every plant like this one, a full and honest accounting of what went wrong.
