TCEQ will monitor cleanup of tank fire near Bon Wier

The pipeline fire that occurred a week ago, March 5 at 2 p.m., caused no injuries or damages beyond the area of the fire, according to Newton County Judge Truman Dougherty.

Dougherty, Emergency Management Coordinator Billy Ted Smith and assistant coordinator Joe Wilkerson visited the site the next day.

Dougherty said a crew was running a pig through the line to clean it and sending the residual to a frac tank. When the crew left to make a phone call, a flame started, caught the tank on fire, blew the tires on the truck and sent flames and smoke into the sky.

It created a noise that shook the earth, according to employees at the nearby Southern Forest Products plant, who were evacuated as a precaution.

John Barnett, media contact for Trunkline Gas who owns the pipeline, said the fire was not a rupture of the 10-inch natural gas pipeline; it was the tank that caught fire. He said teams from the company will investigate the incident to determine cause.

The incident happened in a heavily wooded area off U.S. Highway 190 near Bon Wier.

Smith said the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) had crews on the scene to monitor the cleanup. Smith said the area was boomed off as a precaution against pollution runoff. Smith said after an incident like this, it takes a couple of weeks to repair, clean up and remediate the soil at the site. TCEQ monitors the pipeline company's compliance with state requirements.