At approximately 1700 hours on 21 May 2012, Mr. Jerry Thomas of the Union County Office of Emergency Management, El Dorado, Arkansas notified the National Response Center (NRC Report No. 1012214) of an incident involving an abandoned tank battery located approximately 4 miles northwest of El Dorado, Union County, Arkansas that had occurred at approximately 1530 hours on 21 May 2012. Mr. Jerry Thomas notified the NRC in lieu of notification by the potentially responsible party (PRP). The PRP is Long Brothers Oil Company, a private enterprise from Norphlet, AR.  The explosion and fire killed three employees of Long Brothers Oil Company.

At approximately 1820 hours on 21 May 2012 EPA phone duty officer William Rhotenberry notified EPA On-Scene Coordinator (OSC) Mike McAteer and the EPA Superfund Technical Assessment and Response Team (START-3) contractor of an incident that had killed three people and had started a woodland fire outside of El Dorado, Union County, Arkansas. At approximately 1920 hours on 21 May 2012, EPA and START-3 mobilized to El Dorado, Arkansas to coordinate with state and local officials regarding incident details and to assess the potential threat to the surrounding environment and human health. EPA and START-3 arrived in El Dorado, Arkansas in the late evening on 21 May 2012, and coordinated with Jerry Thomas, Union County Office of Emergency Management, to schedule a site environmental assessment for 0830 hours on 22 May 2012.

2.1.2 Response Actions to Date
At 0850 hours on 22 May 2012, EPA and START-3 arrived at the Long Brothers Tank Battery Fire site and coordinated with Union County Office of Emergency Management (UCEM), Union County Sherriff’s Office, Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ), Occupation Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and representative from the Potentially Responsible Party (PRP) Long Brothers Oil Company.

The site is located at geographicac coordinates 33.240058N; 92.746692W in a rural setting located in a woodland.  At the time of arrival, small isolated fires within the wooded areas continued to burn inside the fire line. At 0910 hours EPA, START-3 and ADEQ entered the site to complete an initial environmental site assessment. The site consisted of one gun barrel tank, one 500 gallon polyethylene tank (salt water storage) and one 200 barrel storage tank inside an earthen secondary containment berm. A second 200 barrel storage tank, the source of the incident had been displaced from its original location due to an explosion at the site. There is also one fire damaged pickup truck and one fire damaged mini-excavator on-site and a small oil well located along the north side of the incident area.

Observations inside and around the secondary containment included an unknown quantity of oily sludge in the area of the former/displaced storage tank.  However, tracking firewater runoff channels did not show a significant quantity of oil/oil waste to have entered a small pond located immediately west of the tank battery. Other observed fire water channels did not show sheen, oiled vegetation, or oil residue. Fire water had travelled down gradient from the site approximately 150 feet south and appears to have been stopped by the fire line. The nearest body of water is Holmes Creek located approximately 1.5 miles west of the site. During initial site assessment activities air monitors did not yield any readings above background, and according to the County Sherriff during the response no evacuations or shelter-in-place orders were issued.