Barges collide at entrance of Houston channel

Two barges collided early Monday near the entrance to the Houston Ship Channel after one of the tugboats pushing them lost power.

The Houston Ship Channel itself, which supplies the nation’s busiest petrochemical port, remained open after the collision shortly after 1 a.m. local time (0600 GMT).

The Ship Channel is a 55-foot (17-meter) deep pathway for barges and deep-draft ships cut into the floor of Galveston Bay, which averages 20 feet (6 meters) in depth.

A fire erupted on a barge that’s carrying flammable naphtha, but emergency crews were able to extinguish the flames about four hours later. The Gulf Intracoastal Waterway, 1,300-mile man-made canal that runs along the Gulf of Mexico coastline from Brownsville to St. Marks, Fla., is also closed.

Naphtha is a colorless liquid that smells like gasoline or kerosene, according to a report on KTRK13 in Houston. He said the Coast Guard will assess the possible environmental impact of the collision today.

There are no immediate reports of spills or injuries. That refinery is the second largest in the United States.

One of the barges carrying petroleum product was caught on fire after a collision after the collision of two barges in Texas.

The Ship Chanel on the Bolivar side to mile 348 is now closed.