Blast hurts cruise ship passengers

MADRID, Spain – Twelve passengers on a cruise ship moored in Gibraltar were injured Tuesday after a towering dockside tank holding used oil and water exploded as workers were welding it, sending plumes of black smoke into the air and shrouding the British outpost’s famed “Rock” from view.

A Spaniard who was welding atop the tank suffered life-threatening burns and was scheduled to be transferred to a burn unit at a hospital in the Spanish city of Seville, Gibraltar’s government said in a statement. A second Spaniard suffered less serious injuries.

The passengers aboard the “Independence of the Seas” cruise ship operated by Royal Caribbean suffered injuries ranging from minor burns to a fractured shoulder, the statement said.

Gibraltar’s government said the ship sailed away from the burning tank immediately after the blast, and Royal Caribbean said in statement that it immediately moved “a safe distance away from the dock” and then headed toward its next scheduled stop, the French Mediterranean destination of Cannes.

The company characterized the passengers’ injuries as minor and said all received medical treatment aboard the cruise ship.

Heavy smoke billowed into the air for hours after the blast happened, and efforts to douse the afternoon blaze suffered a setback after a second tank next to the burning one caught fire in the evening, the statement said.

Firefighters who were trying to put out the fire from land were forced to withdraw, and Gibraltar’s government said it was using tug boats to spray water on the raging blaze from the sea. Residents living near the burning tanks were not forced to evacuate, but were advised to close the windows of their homes.

An investigation was under way to determine the cause of the blast, Gibaltar’s government said.

Gibraltar is a popular tourist destination, and the Rock lies at the eastern end of the Strait of Gibraltar, a strategic waterway that links the Atlantic and the Mediterranean and separates Europe from Africa.