This Sunday, August 25th, marks the twelfth anniversary since Venezuela’s biggest oil industry tragedy.One that marked the state of Falcón and the world, when the Amuay refinery, one of the most important crude oil processors in the world, exploded.
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It has been 12 years since the terrible dawn explosion and a fire that lasted for days and woke up the country with an unforgettable roar, which was indelibly etched in the memory of those who survived it. Although even the late President of the Republic, Hugo Chávez Frías, visited the are affected by the event and made several promises, the people of Falcon are still waiting for, among all, a basic public healthcare system that addresses the needs of the people of Paraguaná and the burned patients unit that was promised to be built next to the Doctor Rafael Calles Sierra hospital, which although it is the largest in Paraguaná, lacks supplies and services to attend to simple emergencies and even more so when accidents occur that require specialized attention to burns.
Chávez announced at that time the creation of the burn unit to attend to emergencies, since although they had this important hospital, the Paraguaná Peninsula did not have a burn unit, despite having the two largest refineries in the country that make up the Paraguaná Refining Complex, to date nothing has been effectively done.
After the Amuay explosion, there have been accidents that have left people seriously burned, such as Corpoelec (electrical government monopoly) workers and also an explosion caused by a domestic gas leak in the Bicentenario Housing Complex in Punta Cardón. The burn victims have had to be forwarded to the Coromoto hospital in Maracaibo, because it is the closest burn unit, thus preventing the immediate specialized care that these cases require, in addition to requiring a large movement of equipment, specialists and even helicopters to be able to carry out the transfer.
The Burn Unit for the Doctor Rafael Calles Sierra hospital is an outstanding debt of Venezuela’s central government, both for the oil industry in Falcón and for the inhabitants of the communities that border both refineries. In Falcón, it is not like in other countries where the refineries are on the outskirts of the cities. In this coastal region, the Amuay and Cardón refineries are surrounded by residential and popular sectors that have grown over the years and have become accustomed to the sounds of the flares that are always on.
In the case of the Cardón Community, inhabited mainly by retired oil workers, is a settled area around the Cardón refinery, as well as the fishing settlement of Punta Cardón. Even the fishermen recognize the sounds and fumes emitted by the refinery, also because they have worked there and learned to identify its basic behavior. In the case of Amuay, it is surrounded by the Antiguo Aeropuerto and Alí Primera sectors, both of which were affected during the 2012 explosion. Although many inhabitants were relocated to other sectors, some families remain in the place and also endure the gases, fumes and sounds of the refinery.
These sectors, although they are near the most important crude oil processing plants in Venezuela, suffer from a lack of potable water through pipes, so their inhabitants drill holes in the pipes that carry water to both refineries to supply themselves in vehicles built with waste material which they push by themselves on foot.
They also need paving on their streets that show great deterioration due to lack of maintenance and overflow of sewage. Other areas streets, such as in the Las Piedras sector, have not even been paved for the first time.
In any part of the world, the communities that border the refineries could be the most benefited due to the state company’s social responsibility, however in the Paraguaná Peninsula this is not true. The popular sectors suffer the same needs as other areas, even in some cases, such as the sectors that include the Old Airport, the electrical failures are daily, prolonged and several times a day.
“We have to buy water every week because we have not been able to gather enough to buy a larger storage tank. We have a two thousand liter tank that we fill when the water arrives. When the water arrives, you don’t sleep, you have to do everything while there is water because it won’t arrive for a month. The electricity goes out every day and every now and then and without electricity we can’t turn on the pumps, so we’re left without water again. I have relatives in other areas who are going through the same thing, but the electricity issue here is desperate,” said Nuria Dorante, a resident of ‘Antiguo Aeropuerto’ (Old Airport).
“We in Las Piedras have had access to work at the refinery, you apply and sometimes you get a job. The salaries are low, just enough for food. It’s not like in the past, when one worked and with the retirement pension one fixed up one’s house or car. That’s not possible anymore, that’s why people here prefer to live off fishing,” said a resident of Las Piedras who preferred to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals.
The tragedy of the early morning of August 25th, 2012, left more than 40 dead and at least 160 injured, according to official reports, although are were missing people who were never located. The explosion wiped out the National Guard Detachment, as well as the Hydrogen Plant and the Puramín headquarters.
August 25th will always be a day of mourning for the people of Paraguana in the face of the biggest tragedy ever recorded and from which they need to learn in order to move forward and avoid new events.