Explosions Rip 2 Oil Tankers in Spain; 16 Die

Explosions ripped through two oil tankers Sunday in the harbor of Algeciras near Gibraltar, engulfing both ships in flames. At least 16 people were killed and 19 were missing, authorities said.

Another 34 were injured in what the officials described as Spain’s worst shipping disaster in modern times. They said the final death toll could exceed 40.

“It seemed like an earthquake, houses started shaking,” the proprietor of a beachfront restaurant said. “It was awful, terrible, and people started running away in all directions.”

Many Flee Homes

A dense cloud of black smoke hung over the Bay of Algeciras, and many of the area’s 200,000 inhabitants fled their homes.

Witnesses said a fireball rose 1,500 feet into the air as the explosion ripped apart one of the tankers, the 19,070-ton Panamanian-registered Petragen One.

Bodies were scattered in burning oil slicks over a wide area of the Bay of Algeciras.

The Spanish Civil Guard said the disaster was set off by an explosion on board the Petragen One as it was unloading highly flammable naphtha, a liquid chemical.

But a South Korean crew member from the Petragen One said the first explosion occurred in the 4,222-ton Spanish oil tanker Camponavia, which was moored alongside.

Both vessels were on a floating jetty 250 yards from the San Roque petrochemical refinery.

Residents were evacuated from their homes near the refinery’s huge oil storage tanks. Helicopters from the nearby U.S. naval base at Rota helped in the rescue work.

The Spanish tanker was blasted in two and the Japanese-chartered Panamanian vessel sank to the harbor bottom within minutes.

The dead included Spanish seamen and dockworkers and Japanese and Korean sailors.

The Petragen One was owned by Wellis, Ltd., of Panama and the Spanish ship by the state oil distribution company, Campsa.

More than eight hours after the first explosion, patches of naphtha were still ablaze.

Port officials said that most of the crew members were on board their ships at the time of the explosions. There were 29 Koreans and Japanese on board the Petragen One and 30 Spaniards on the Camponavia.

Rescue officials said the final death figure could rise when divers manage to search the hulls, which are lying in shallow water.

Those on board stood almost no chance of surviving, they said.

Seven Spanish dockworkers whose jeep was hit by the shock wave of the blasts were among the dead.

Highways between the Atlantic port of Cadiz and the Mediterranean resort city of Malaga were blocked off to facilitate rescue work.

San Roque is a major petrochemical port built during the regime of the late Gen. Francisco Franco to provide work for local residents after he sealed off the border with the British colony of Gibraltar.

The border has since been reopened and officials said Gibraltar’s hospitals were helping to treat the injured.