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Suspicious Blasts Hit LyondellBasell Complex In France

by Alex Scott
July 20, 2015 | A version of this story appeared in Volume 93, Issue 29

Two explosions 1,600 feet apart rocked LyondellBasell Industries’ petrochemicals complex in Berre L’Etang, France, early in the morning of July 14. One explosion ignited a tank of gasoline and the other a tank of naphtha. Police told French media that they found a hole in the site’s perimeter fence and an electronic device that could have been used to start the fires. “First indications show that we are dealing with a criminal act, but no motive has been established,” France’s Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve told the country’s lower house of parliament. The production complex, which features an ethylene cracker and polymer plants, began operating normally soon after the fires were extinguished later that day, LyondellBasell says.

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