A couple of weeks ago, a fire broke out at the Richmond Chevron refinery. To my chagrin, it was a rare 4 hours where I turned off the internet to work and did not hear of it until it had gotten pretty dark. I wish I could’ve gone out to shoot it, but I would imagine, it would’ve been pretty hard to beat that shot of the hugely ominous smoke cloud sprawling over the bay.
If you haven’t read about it, a timeline of events can be found at SFist. What’s confounding is that despite this fire (and the other ones at this same plant in the last decade or two), apparently it has a better safety record than most plants. It is pretty astonishing that such a rich industry would be unable to maintain a near perfect record. But then it’s not surprising is it? Issuing an oil company a $200,000 fine is like giving Paris Hilton a $60 parking ticket and expecting to change her parking behavior.