(June 27, 2005) -- On Friday June 24, explosions and fires rocked an industrial plant south of St. Louis, not far from residential areas and not terribly far from downtown St. Louis.

Multiple flammable products in proximity to one another created a domino effect, one source igniting another, sending fireballs skyward, turning metal tanks into shrapnel that fell blocks away as black smoke spread over populated areas.

LBReport.com links below to video and photo coverage by KSDK (St. Louis TV channel 5). The live images were flashed around the world on Friday via CNN and MSNBC among other sources. KSDK has graciously granted us permission to hyperlink to their coverage...which we do below.

The Port of LB permits flammable and potentially toxic materials in relatively close proximity to each other not far from densely populated residential areas and not terribly far from downtown LB.

Under LB's 1980's era City Charter, a non-elected, non-recallable Board of Harbor Commissioners currently has the power to decide if an 80+ million gallon Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) facility should be built on Pier T, roughly two miles from downtown LB.

KSDK says the St. Louis industrial plant's "primary products are atmospheric gases -- oxygen, nitrogen, argon and rare gases (produced when air is compressed, cooled, distilled and condensed) and process and speciality gases - carbon dioxide, helium, hydrogen, semiconductor products and acetylene (produced as by-products of chemical production or recovered from gas.)" There were no reports of serious injuries from what took place.

To access KSDK, St. Louis TV coverage:

• Watch KSDK video of the fire here

• Watch more KSDK video of the fire here

• Watch ground video of the fire here

• Watch more ground video of the fire here

• Expanded Photo Gallery

• Text reviewing fire