An oil tanker was engulfed in flames in the Gulf of Mexico
An fire aboard one of Mexican state oil company Pemex's oil tankers in the Gulf of Mexico on Saturday forced the crew to evacuate, in what is the latest accident to plague the struggling state-run firm.
The blaze, reportedly caused by an explosion, took place about 8 miles off the coast of Boca del Rio in southeastern Veracruz state on the tanker Burgos.
All the crew were able to make it off the ship and get back to shore safely, Pemex said in a tweet early Saturday afternoon.
Images tweeted by Pemex showed the vessel giving off plumes of smoke as another boat hosed the tanker. According to Mexican news site Sin Embargo, the Burgos was carrying 80,000 barrels of diesel fuel, 71,000 barrels of unleaded gasoline, and 16,000 barrels of desulfurized gasoline.
Other Mexican navy ships moved into the area to put barriers in place in case of a leak from the tanker, Sin Embargo reported. Four tugboats from Veracruz's port authority also arrived on the scene to with special foams to use to fight the fire.
The Burgos was one of the oldest ships in Pemex's fleet and one of 17 tanker-type vessels the state oil company uses to transport fuel in the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific.
The fire follows a series of other mishaps at Pemex, which is coping with major losses, increased competition at home, sharp budget cuts, and lower revenue due to the oil-price rout. On land, the state oil company has had to deal with rampant oil theft from pipelines throughout the country by both criminal groups and regular people.
While no deaths have been reported, Pemex has experienced fatal incidents in the recent past.
In April, more than 30 people died and dozens were injured in an explosion at a petrochemical plant in southeast Veracruz state, a joint venture between Pemex and another firm.
In 2013, at least 37 people were killed by a blast at Pemex's Mexico City headquarters, and 26 people died in a fire at a Pemex natural-gas facility in northern Mexico in 2012.
A 2015 fire at a Pemex platform in the Bay of Campeche affected oil output and cost the company up to $780 million.
(Reporting for Reuters by Natalie Schachar and Noe Torres; Editing by Dave Graham and Matthew Lewis)