February08

"One of them Terrorists"

Yesterday, a pretty exciting/scary/newsworthy thing happened in Kansas City – there was a large explosion at a chemical plant and subsequently a humongous fire. Around 2:20, someone told us to look outside our window(s). Looking to the NorthEast, all we could see was a GIANT plume of black smoke. We have seen smoke from fires before here in KC, but this one was insane. It looked like a tornado.

Quickly enough, the fire department arrived on the scene and evacuated all persons in a one-mile radius. The crazy, but safe, part about the fire, is that they couldn’t fight the fire since the chemical plant is/was so close to the river... if they had, the chemical runoff would get into our water supply.

As if a single snowflake had hit the ground, panic ensued. Almost instantaneously cars were packing the roads. We turned on the TV to hear the latest from the news crews and they had already started to talk to witnesses. I joked with Bruno about how long it would take for someone to blame terrorists.

10 minutes.

While talking to a man that worked in the area, he mentioned that when he heard the explosion and saw the fires/smoke... he “thought it was one of them terrorists.”

Can anyone say paranoia? Terrorists? Here? In Kansas City? Blowing up chemical plants that’s near to nobody? On a day that just happened to have a wind blowing from the Northeast? I’m pretty sure they’d pick a different target... but that’s just me.

While some reporters were picking up the ash from the smoke (and then informing people to NOT do that), some residents were afraid to go home downtown. Why let this paranoia creep in until the news reporters say you need to worry? If you’re concerned about “fallout,” you may need to get out of the city entirely (look at the photo – this smoke stretched far into the metro).

And the latest I’ve read... the air is safe to breathe and it’s safe to go home or back to work.

+ original post date: February 8, 2007 08:32 AM
+ categories: KC, WTF