The death toll from the tank-rupture incident at a Washington state paper mill on Tuesday rose to two with nine people still missing and presumed dead, authorities said.
The Longview fire department said in a statement on Wednesday afternoon that one person who was transported to the hospital following the disaster at Nippon Dynawave Packaging Co on Tuesday morning has died.
The agency said that recovery efforts would begin at the mill on Wednesday after a delay due to “safety concerns of the structural integrity of the damaged tank”. Authorities have said there is no hope of finding any additional survivors.
The incident began when an industrial tank ruptured and released white liquor, a highly destructive chemical mixture used in the paper industry. In the initial aftermath, officials confirmed one death and nine injuries, including a firefighter who had responded to the scene.
Before any bodies of the missing can be recovered, crews must stabilize the tank, which was at risk of collapsing further and leaking more of the caustic liquid. Officials said they would only work during daylight because of the dangers.
“An inspection revealed the remaining product is a significantly smaller volume, allowing emergency responders to develop a plan to move forward to remove it,” the fire department said.
While the cause remained unknown, authorities said there was no threat to the community, a Columbia River city of about 40,000 people with long ties to the Washington and Oregon paper and lumber industries.
It was the second notable chemical tank failure in days on the west coast, following the evacuation of thousands of southern California residents due to a damaged tank at an aerospace plant.
The sprawling Longview plant, which employs about 1,000 people, makes material for tissues, printing paper, cups, plates and cartons. The facility sits right along the river next to other timber, paper and chemical businesses.
The paper mill tank was holding about 900,000 gallons (3.4m liters) of a liquid made of mostly sodium hydroxide and sodium sulfide. Known as “white liquor”, it’s used with heat to break down wood to make kraft paper, a durable material used in packaging, shopping bags and other products.
Scott Goldstein, a fire chief with Cowlitz county, said Tuesday night that the tank still held about 90,000 gallons (more than 340,000 liters) of the volatile liquid.
“We don’t know until we know, hopefully tomorrow, how we can stabilize the tank. Do we remove the product first? Do we stabilize the tank first or vice versa?” Goldstein said.
Following the tank’s rupture, the liquid spilled into a drainage ditch, said Brittny Goodsell, a state ecology department spokesperson. Officials have said there are no issues related to air quality or drinking water in Longview, but urged the public to avoid ditches and dikes while the area undergoes water testing.
The Washington state department of ecology and the US Environmental Protection Agency are overseeing operations to determine any environmental impacts related to the incident, the fire department said.
At a community vigil on Tuesday night, dozens of people gathered to pray, light candles and embrace loved ones.
Crystal Moldenhauer, a Longview resident, said she had friends at the plant who remained unaccounted for. She said people had called and texted each other all day trying to figure out what happened.
“We’re all still waiting for answers,” she said. “There’s families that have been torn apart, and we don’t know why.”
Safety complaints were filed against Nippon Dynawave in March and May. The state’s labor and industries department said on X that both were unrelated to the current situation. One was an anonymous complaint about a valve on a tank, according to the department, which noted that it was not the tank that imploded.
Nippon Dynawave, a subsidiary of Japan-based Nippon Paper Group, has been fined $3,400 for three separate health and safety violations found by Washington department of labor and industries inspectors since the start of 2021, according to the department’s online database.
Forty-three people died from January 2021 to mid-October 2023 as a result of hazardous chemical incidents in the US, according to a paper released by a network of environmental justice organizations in late 2023.
