She Went Boom!

As I was leaving the Dole Cannery Theaters and headed up to the sixth floor of parking structure yesterday, I noticed two large plumes of water being sprayed onto the empty lot next to the office building

Fire crews were hosing down the area, the police were out, and traffic was being diverted away from the area, forcing me to take a detour from my usual route home. Dozens of people were evacuating the building on Iwilei Road close to Pacific Street.

Apparently, there had been loud booms (one large, two smaller) about an hour earlier (around 1:15 p.m.), most likely gas or combustible vapors had ignited.

It’s suspected that the booms were caused by underground chemical reactions during a soil-decontamination process that produces flammable gases. The gas normally is captured and burned.

That’s a dangerous area for explosions. I’d heard long ago that there is petroleum leakage from tanks along the harbor front that have migrated underground into that particular area.

Perhaps I’ll avoid the area for the next couple of days.