On Thursday, the U.S. Coast Guard announced that a fire erupted on an oil platform in the Gulf of Mexico not far from the coast of Louisiana, as reported by ABC News. Authorities are still working to completely extinguish it, but no one was injured.
Working in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico can be an isolating situation that can turn horrific in the case of an emergency, but fortunately, no one manning the platform suffered any injuries. The fire reportedly began at 2:30 a.m. local time, 80 miles outside of Grand Isle, Louisiana. Luckily, the four people manning the platform detected the fire and quickly evacuated the platform. They were picked up by rescue authorities.
Details concerning what caused the fire are scarce at the moment, but Coast Guard Petty Officer Third Class Travis Magee did not detect any traces of oil-to-water pollution at this time. The Coast Guard went on to say several emergency services, including non-profit oil spill response organization Clean Gulf and an HC-144 Ocean Sentry airplane from Alabama, have helped suppress the fire, but it has not been fully extinguished yet.
This is not the first time an oil platform caught fire in the Gulf of Mexico. The 2010 Deepwater Horizon platform explosion caused millions of gallons of oil to spill into the Gulf and killed 11 workers in the process.