Oil refinery fire near Tehran burns into second day
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Tehran: A massive fire at an oil refinery at the state-owned Tondgooyan Petrochemical Co. to the south of Tehran burned into a second day on Thursday as firefighters struggled to extinguish the flames.
The fire began on Wednesday night, sending a huge plume of black smoke into the sky over Iran's capital.
As per the reports from the Oil Ministry's SHANA news agency, the fire broke out over a leak in two waste tanks at the facility.
Though Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh visited the scene overnight and assured the public that the fire wouldn't affect production, Iranians had to queue up for gasoline on Thursday morning which is the start of the weekend in the Islamic Republic.
SHANA also quoted refinery spokesman Shaker Khafaei as saying authorities hoped the fire would extinguish itself after running out of fuel in the coming hours.
Though it wasn't immediately clear what started the blaze, hot summer weather in Iran did cause fires in the city in the past.
Tehran had reported nearly 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) on Wednesday.
On the same day, a fire had struck the largest warship in the Iranian navy, which later sank in the Gulf of Oman.