Deaths, injuries confirmed in chemical incident at US plant in Washington

A number of people have died and several have been badly injured after a chemical leak at a plant in the northwestern US state of Washington, officials said Tuesday.

A tank containing a substance known as white liquor burst at the Nippon Dynawave Packaging Company in Longview, an hour north of Portland on the Washington-Oregon border, a statement said.

"Preliminary information indicates the rupture resulted in multiple critical injuries," said the statement, issued jointly by the company and Longview Fire Department.

"Officials can also confirm fatalities related to the incident."

The statement gave no numbers on the people killed or injured, but said there was no threat to the public.

The Seattle Times, citing firefighting officials, said 10 people had been hurt: nine company employees and one firefighter.

The injuries range from minor to critical, the paper reported.

White liquor is a highly alkaline solution containing sodium hydroxide and sodium sulfide.

It is used to break down wood chips in the early stages of paper manufacturing to create the pulp from which paper is made.

Nippon Dynawave Packaging, which is a subsidiary of Japan's Nippon Paper Group, says on its website that it produces eight billion single serve containers every year, supplying customers in North America, Asia, and around the world.

The incident in Washington comes as around 16,000 remain evacuated from their homes in Orange County, California after a tank of volatile chemicals began overheating.

Firefighters dealing with that episode have worked since Friday to cool the 7,000 gallons (26,000 liters) of methyl methacrylate, which had been threatening to explode, sending a plume of toxic fumes over a heavily populated area just a few miles (kilometers) from Disneyland.

On Sunday they announced that the threat of a large explosion had been eliminated, but that they were still working to tame the tank, which is owned by the Britain-based GKN Aerospace.