After a valve on board a tanker trailer started to leak early Wednesday morning, Dow's Houston Operations Bayport site remains stable and in partnership with local officials, [the event] has been downgraded to Level 1, the company reported on Twitter this morning.
"[Level 1] means the evacuation radius has been lifted since there is no longer a risk of community impact and the event will now be managed solely by Dow Emergency Response teams," the tweet reported. "This also means road closures will be lifted and Dow's Bayport site will have restricted access as we continue to manage the event; air monitoring both on-site and at-the-fence line continue to indicate there is no off-site impact."
At the time of the incident, crews applied water to the tanker to keep it cool throughout the night. The company reported no injuries due to the venting of hydroxy ethyl acrylate, which the company said is an acrylic used in coatings and adhesives.
A shelter-in-place notice was issued by the city of La Porte due to the chemical incident for some residents Wednesday morning.
While the impacted region included mostly industrial facilities, at least one neighborhood was within the evacuation zone. Fewer than 10 homes were identified by authorities as being in the affected area, according to La Porte chief of police Steve Deardoff. People living in two of those households refused to leave, emergency officials said during a Wednesday briefing.
Dow Houston Operations offers www.readyharris.org for up-to-date air monitoring data and encourages the community to visit La Porte Office of Emergency Management for road closure information.
"We continue to manage the event, but would like to thank our community partners for their support," the company finalized in its tweet.
