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‘No shutdown’ at Cilacap refinery after blaze: Pertamina
“We will investigate the incident further. It is vital that we learn from it,” said Pertamina president director Nicke Widyawati.
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A tank at Pertamina's Cilacap oil refinery in Central Java is sprayed with fire retardant on Saturday. Pertamina announced on Sunday that the fire had been extinguished. (Courtesy of Pertamina/Handout)
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tate-owned oil and gas holding company Pertamina announced on Sunday that a fire that had erupted at the Cilacap oil refinery in Central Java the night before had been extinguished and that the plant’s operations had not been significantly interrupted.
The fire broke out in tank 36T-102, which contained 31,000 kiloliters of the raw components of gasoline brand Pertalite, at around 07:20 p.m. on Saturday. The blaze was extinguished at 07:45 a.m. on Sunday, and the situation was declared “all clear” 90 minutes later, Pertamina chief executive officer (CEO) Djoko Priyono said on Sunday.
Pertamina president director Nicke Widyawati said the operations of the Cilacap refinery had not been disturbed because the firefighting team had managed to prevent the spread of the blaze to other tanks.
“The [Cilacap] refinery continues to operate. There has been no shutdown, so [the incident] did not impact the production plan,” Nicke said at a virtual press briefing on Sunday.
She added that Pertamina had a sufficient supply of gasoline and urged the public not to panic-buy fuel in response to the incident. The company, she said, would conduct an audit to identify the cause of the incident.
“We will investigate the incident further. It is vital that we learn from it,” Nicke said.
Alfian Nasution, the president director of Pertamina subsidiary PT Pertamina Patra Niaga, said the company’s current stock of Pertalite could last more than 10 days, while its stock of Pertamax and Premium could last for more than two weeks.
Some 80 residents of Lomanis village, Cilacap regency, were briefly evacuated to a nearby community center and a mosque. As of Sunday, they had all returned to their homes, Djoko added.
Eko Sunarno, the Cilacap general manager of Pertamina’s refinery arm, PT Kilang Pertamina Internasional, said on Saturday that the fire was thought to have been caused by a lightning strike, as quoted by kompas.id, but added that the company would make an official determination after the investigation.
Saturday’s fire was the second incident at the Cilacap refinery this year. In June, a fire also thought to have been caused by a lightning strike broke out in one of the facility’s tanks, kompas.com reported.
Pertamina had to temporarily shut down its Balongan refinery in Indramayu, West Java, after flames engulfed the facility on March 29 and knocked out electricity in the area.
