re: Today is the 29th anniversary of the Exxon refinery explosion in Baton Rouge

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I remember it getting down to 9 or 10 degrees once in the 80s. Almost every house on our street had busted pipes.

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It was that day. Some areas registered single digits outside of the city. But the official doodad didn't get that low.
The day before I was walking on a creek that iced over and fell in that motherfricker. Luckily I was only about 1/4 mile from home.

Ex girlfriend and I were driving over to my BIL and sister's house for my family gift exchange. BIL and sister both worked at Exxon. While driving, I thought my car hit a new pothole on Essen because the whole car shook. Didn't remember a big pothole being in that section of road and found it a bit odd. I later realized that was the explosion that I felt.
Anyway, when we got to my sister's house, my family was there but my sister and brother in law were already on their way to the plant.
After the gift exchange, I drove out to Baton Rouge beach, and walked on the frozen lake with the black plumes of smoke from Exxon in the background. Wish I still had those pictures of the lake that day that my ex girlfriend took. They were pretty cool.

I was driving on the interstate somewhere around the 10-110 split. Shook the car. Scared the crap out of me.

Luckily, global warming won’t let this happen again. Doesn’t get below 10 in Baton Rouge anymore.

Our house was off Pondarosa and Locust Street and my nephew and I heard the blast and it literally slammed the door open and rattled the windows. So we walked outside to see what it was and everybody else was doing the same thing.

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t’s not about guys sitting at a board pushing buttons. It’s about knowing which buttons to push and when to push them. And that sometimes takes place in a very quick timeframe. And getting it wrong could have devastating consequences. Lot of responsibility there folks.

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Every senior operator with some time is home with his family during the Holidays. It’s a bunch of green horns working two steps above their pay grade on those controls.

I was a kid in Monticello and had just opened the refrigerator at the same time. The refrigerator and all of its contents shook. I was confused until I saw on the news what had happened.

I was at Baton Rouge Sports Unlimited and the power went out, then a minute later the shockwave came and shook the whole building. I still remember the way the ceiling tiles were all flapping around.

So everyone was there with only the emergency lights on and then what felt like an earthquake in south LA. Everyone quickly left the building and once outside we could see the smoke and we knew it was a plant explosion.

Working at Holmes in Bon Marche. Lights went out and then BOOM. Building shook. Lights came back on a few minutes and you could see the smoke.