Black smoke was visible over March Point Wednesday afternoon as a result of Tesoro Refinery said was boiler problems, and not a fire, though flames were easily visible from Anacortes.
In a news release, Tesoro said that refinery experienced an unexpected shutdown of three boilers that produce the majority of the refinery’s steam. The loss of steam has required a number of process units to be temporarily shut down and process gases were temporarily diverted to our flare safety relief system.
"The flare system is designed to handle this type of event and is working properly to safely burn-off the excess gas," said John McDarment, Manager Human Resources. "Smoke that was observed was due to burning off of gases at the flare and was not associated with a fire at the facility. All personnel are accounted for and there are no injuries associated with the event. Tesoro takes pride in being a good neighbor in the community. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused."