1 killed, 9 others feared dead in Washington state chemical tank implosion

Posted on by Taiwo Adebulu

2 min readUpdated: May 27, 2026 09:44 AM IST

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At least one person was killed, and nine others were missing after massive chemical tank imploded and collapsed Tuesday at a Washington paper mill, news agency Associated Press reported.

The authories said there was no hope for rescue of the nine who were unaccounted for.

The chemical tank had nearly a million gallons of a highly corrosive liquid. The cause of the accident remained unclear.

Nine other people were injured, some of them gravely, in the spill at Nippon Dynawave Packaging Co. in Longview.
“At the moment we are not aware of any rescues that are yet to be made,” Cowlitz Fire and Rescue Chief Scott Goldstein said during a Tuesday evening news conference.

In the recovery effort to be resumed on Wednesday morning, emergency responders would work on stabilising the collapsed tank, that was still holding about 90,000 gallons of “white liquor” inside, and then launch a search operation for the missing. The officials said they would be able to work only during daytime because the tanks still has a risk of leaking more caustic liquid and collapsing.

Among the victims, some suffered burns or inhalation injuries. Among the injured was a firefighter who was responding to the situation.

“We don’t know until we know, hopefully tomorrow, how we can stabilise the tank. Do we remove the product first? Do we stabilise the tank first or the vice versa?” Goldstein said.

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The authorities howver assured that there were no threat to the public.

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