When Daliesky Rancol Bueno was heading to Matanzas on September 8, the block of the supertanker base was no longer burning in flames, where, on the afternoon of Friday, August 5, 2022, an electric discharge hit the roof of the tank 52 of the largest location of its kind in the country, generating a large-scale fire.
Apparently the worst was over: 16 killed in the line of duty; explosions, columns of smoke; the city in suspense fearful for its air, for its bay, for almost everything.
Those images were in his memory, while his expertise calculated how hard would be the work that awaited him in a dangerous and urgent recovery.
Once on the ground, reality surpassed his idea of the magnitude of the disaster and the dedication of many men in the recovery work.
The only Guantanamo member of the Cuban system of oil trading companies with knowledge and experience in industrial security had arrived at dawn at the place where he would remain at the foot of the brigade that they would dismantle. "It seemed like broad daylight because of the number of men who were still working at that time, enduring vapors and gas emissions of all kinds.
"The mission at that time was to disassemble the 4 burnt-out tanks that, despite all the deformation caused by the fire, exceeded three meters in height," he recalls.
Already in the supertanker Base
Never in his 18 years of work and 43 years of age, this chemical engineer had had an experience as impressive as the one lived during 15 days in Matanzas.
Now, back at his post in the chemical product testing laboratory, where he works as a specialist in Quality Management, one of the many Cubans whose outstanding work in recovery was nationally recognized in a solemn act in the country's capital. , he can't get rid of the really heroic images:
"The welders disassembled the steel plates with flame cutting, from inside the tanks, to then remove all the burned fuel. They were mountains of charred oil. A very complex task, because the interaction of the welding equipment with the burned fuel could produce flames and, in fact, there were small fires that were quickly controlled, but it was still a job in very dangerous conditions, where any carelessness could put their lives at risk.
"Those men practically did not stop, they did not notice if it was already necessary to change the singed gloves and overalls, because in the heat of work they forgot it, but that's why we were there at their feet, so that all the procedures that They ensured safety and security.
"When I arrived, although the environment was already quite recovered, there was still a lot to do. I went as a specialist to assess risks and dangers, which were many in a large area where large teams of all kinds moved day and night. I saw young and not so young men with their hands and faces almost burned by so much heat.
"They were all pure challenges for me. I would spend up to 12 hours next to them in a place where there was not a shadow, walking from one side to the other among the noise, the vapors that were still being released from the tanks, but also from the equipment, all very heavy.
"I could not believe such a level of endurance, nor did I imagine mine, so it has been my great job test, the revelation of what human beings are capable of doing with motivations to give everything in the line of duty."
Taken from Venceremos
Read more...