DEER PARK, Texas — A shelter-in-place order covering the Houston-area city of Deer Park was lifted at 10 p.m. Tuesday, a few hours after a release of hydrogen sulfide gas at the Lubrizol chemical plant sent residents indoors.
The city issued the order early Tuesday evening, shortly after 6:30 p.m., as its Office of Emergency Management tracked a Level 3 notification from Lubrizol. Level 3 describes an event that reaches beyond the facility boundary and has an off-site impact. Residents were told to go inside, close doors and windows, switch off heating and cooling systems and keep phone lines free for emergency alerts.
According to Harris County Public Health, phosphorus pentasulfide reacted with water at the plant and produced the hydrogen sulfide. Once the chemical was confirmed, Lubrizol lowered the incident to Level 2. Lubrizol said the incident happened at its 41 Tidal Road site during maintenance on an idled unit. Earlier in the day, the company had said it was doing planned maintenance on equipment that can produce a nuisance odor, and it expected no impact on the community.
The city kept the order in place at 9:15 p.m. as it waited for outside verification and confirmation from Lubrizol, noting that air monitoring still showed normal levels. Monitoring at the plant’s fence line detected nothing unusual, and the city lifted the order at 10 p.m. while saying the incident was ongoing but posed no threat to the community.
Neighboring communities also took precautions. La Porte firefighters ran air monitoring along the boundary between La Porte and Deer Park, and Shell’s chemical plant in Deer Park issued its own precautionary shelter-in-place order at the time of the incident. The city said it would post updates on its website and through its Office of Emergency Management social media accounts.
Section: More Houston TX crime news
Filed under: Houston TX Public Safety News
