They put out the Sants bonfire more than 12 hours later: "I was there, they were cutting with an angle grinder"

BarcelonaThe large flare that was burning since Wednesday night at the Plaça de Sants metro construction site has been extinguished, more than twelve hours after the explosion that left eight workers injured, two of them seriously. The Barcelona Firefighters have managed to completely cut off the gas flow and have declared the emergency over. Now, however, the drilling machine that caused the incident must be moved and its causes clarified.

The head of the Civil Works and Infrastructure Division of the Generalitat, Carles Vaccaro, explained that there are two causes to investigate. One is what caused the gas leak in a pipeline due to the works, and the other is what caused the explosion. The latter, he said, corresponds to the gas company, Nedgia, which was carrying out the repair and is therefore the company's "exclusive" responsibility. It is now being investigated and they expect to speak with the people who were in the area and the injured workers to clarify the facts. 

The leak was detected on Wednesday around 2:40 p.m., after a gas pipeline was affected during the station's accessibility works. The explosion, however, occurred hours later, minutes before eleven at night. The specific causes of the ignition are still being investigated.

"They were cutting with an angle grinder"

L'ARA was able to speak this Thursday with Mohamed El Amri, a worker for one of the subcontracted companies for the works, who worked in the area on Wednesday. "I work here and I was there yesterday. They were cutting with an angle grinder. I left around eight in the evening," he explains. Another operator working on the construction site also told L'ARA that work was being done with this tool during the afternoon and points to sparks as a possible explanation for the ignition: "When working, while they were cutting, sparks were flying, and with the gas... surprise." This is, however, the worker's interpretation and the causes of the explosion have yet to be clarified.

The smell of gas was already perceptible on Wednesday afternoon, according to some neighbors. Eduard Barrabés, who lives on Almeria street, recalls that around 4:30 p.m. "there was a strong smell of gas" and that Olzinelles street was already blocked off. "I had to go towards Badal street and I couldn't get through anymore. We thought it would be a one-off thing, that they would fix it and that would be it," he explains. The man assures that he had not seen the large flare until this Thursday morning.

They were also surprised by the cordon around a jewelry store in the area. "We smelled a lot of gas, but they told us we could continue working. The surprise came in the afternoon when, at the time of opening the store at 4:30 p.m., the sales assistants said they couldn't enter because the area was cordoned off," explains the owner. "We went out into the street and saw that everything was blocked off and that the Firefighters were taking measurements in the sewers in case gas had infiltrated and they were knocking on apartments to evacuate," he recalls.

Self-extinguishing flame

"From a gas perspective, the emergency is currently under control and has concluded," explained Albert Ventosa, head of intervention for the Barcelona Fire Department, this midday. Throughout the night, the Fire Department avoided directly extinguishing the flare due to the risk of gas dispersion and limited themselves to cooling the surroundings while blocking the various points in the network that fed the leak. Once the gas supply was completely cut off on Thursday, the flare self-extinguished.

Now, the pending task is to remove the drilling rig, which is stuck in the ground and poses a risk of falling onto the public road, an operation that will require a heavy-duty crane expected to arrive between this afternoon and evening. "It was spectacular, but the risk was contained," Ventosa summarized.

For his part, the third deputy mayor of the Barcelona City Council, Albert Batlle, assured that "the incident is already resolved" and is confident that normality can be restored in the area between this afternoon and the early evening hours. Sant Antoni promenade has already been reopened, while the rest of the road disruptions will remain until the drilling rig is removed. Batlle also announced that the causes of the incident and possible responsibilities will be analyzed: "We need to look at the causes and seek corrective elements." For now, the City Council sees no reason why the works cannot continue.