More than a dozen crew members were injured; one drowned swimming to safety
By Andrew Dodson
The Bay City Times
BAY CITY, Mich. (AP) — As a 20-year-old firefighter, only nine months into his career, Todd Shorkey had only heard stories about those “once-in-a-lifetime” fires.
These are the fires that are talked about for the rest of one’s life. The type that a community never forgets. A fire so spectacular, so stupendous, so colossal that it requires you to freeze and let it soak in.
“Some people wait their whole career for a fire like this,” Shorkey told The Bay City Times. “I got it in the first nine months of my career.”
Near the end of his 24-hour shift at about 8 a.m. on Sunday, Sept. 16, 1990, Shorkey was sipping a cup of coffee when a call came over the radio for a “boat fire.” As he left the station and saw an incredible plume of black smoke rising over Bay City he quickly knew it was more than that.
Wednesday marked the 25th anniversary of the MV Jupiter explosion. While moored on the west side of the Saginaw River, unloading 2.3 million gallons of unleaded gasoline at Total Petroleum, the tanker broke away from its lines after a freighter passed by it.
A former Bay City Times reporter described what happened next:
“As a soaking rain pelted the sailors, hell visited the Saginaw River.”
At about 8:30 a.m. that Sunday, the Buffalo, a freighter measuring 635-feet long — nearly twice the length of the Jupiter — was heading up the Saginaw River to unload a cargo of coal and passed by the tanker. At the time of its passing, according to an accident report by the National Transportation Safety Board, the Jupiter broke away from its berth and its stern swung out into the river, rupturing the hose that was discharging gasoline to the pier and damaging the pipeline on the pier. Gasoline spilled on the pier and onto the deck of the Jupiter.
Electrical cables to two motor-operated valves that closed off the pipelines were torn apart, causing a spark that ignited the spilled gasoline.
It didn’t take long before a series of massive explosions in the cargo tanks destroyed the entire middle section of the vessel.
“The flames were 20 to 30 feet in the air and the horrendous smoke ... it was unbelievable,” Charles Prescott, the vessel’s chief engineering officer, told a Times reporter following the explosion.
He later described the sound of the explosion as a “sonic boom.”
“It was so terrible that paint and soot sifted down from overhead.”
Members of the 17-man crew started evacuating the ship, some jumping into a cold Saginaw River. About 10 minutes later, a U.S. Coast Guard rescue crew was at the scene plucking sailors from the water.
More than a dozen crew members were injured — most treated for mild cases of hypothermia and minor burns and abrasions. Thomas Sexton, a crewman from Iowa, was the lone fatality. Sexton drowned while trying to swim to safety after the vessel exploded.
Dr. George Ascherl Jr., a radiologist who lives in Bay City, watched the horrific scene unfold from between 100 and 300 feet away. He was taking his sailboat, the Wild Irish, to Pier 7 Marina for the winter and was abreast of the Jupiter when it exploded.
“It was one of the most frightening scenes I’ve ever witnessed,” Ascherl said this past week, nearly 25 years after the explosion. “The intensity of it all was something I’d only imagine seeing in a warzone.”
Instead of continuing down the Saginaw River, Ascherl stood by to help the men who were jumping into the Saginaw River, he said. He negotiated his sailboat near the stern of the Jupiter. The ship’s captain advised him to stand off, but stand by and not come any closer to the burning ship.
He then watched members of the crew take down the American flag that was flying on the windy day and evacuate their freighter.
Shorkey said he stood in disbelief when he arrived at the smoke-filled, fiery scene.
“It was, by far, the most dramatic fire I’ve ever been to,” said the 25-year veteran firefighter.
It was confusion at first, he said, and there were worries of more explosions. Firefighters established a water supply, stretched supply lines to the river and set up portable monitor guns, but their equipment couldn’t reach the burning ship, Shorkey said.
The Jupiter burned furiously through the day and night, according to media reports. Knowing gasoline was still on board, officials thought the only strategy was to let it burn.
But the temperature of the fire was causing the Jupiter’s hull to buckle. According to media reports, only 6 inches of the hull remained above the water line. Several other explosions throughout the day and into the evening made things worse.
The “let-it-burn” strategy was thrown out.
Following the explosion, Total Petroleum officials called Texas-based Boots & Coots to battle the blaze. Officials from the company, now owned by Halliburton, arrived early Monday morning, bringing equipment and expertise to fight the fire.
Thousands of gallons of special foam was shot into the flames. Anything still burning needed to be extinguished because even the smallest flame could re-ignite the entire ship.
Actual firefighting started at 1:30 p.m. Monday and it took less than an hour for the team from Boots & Coots and the U.S. Coast Guard to put the fire out after it had burned for 29 hours.
But it wasn’t done. At 9:30 p.m. that evening, after many members of the state and national media left the scene, the Jupiter began burning again. Firefighters again smothered the freighter with foam.
By Tuesday morning, the fire was finally out, but an investigation that would shut down the shipping channel for more than three weeks was just beginning.
The Jupiter explosion became one of those events that includes the question, “Where were you when it happened?”
Ron Bloomfield, director of operations and chief historian for the Bay County Historical Society, was traveling from Mount Pleasant to Delta College in Bay County and could see a mystery plume of black smoke from M-20.
“The whole way, I could see this massive plume of black smoke and had no idea what it was — you can’t tell distance when you’re traveling like that,” Bloomfield said. “I thought, ‘Is half of Bay City burning?’ “
Saginaw River Marine Historical Society President Don Comtois was driving to Bay City from West Branch following engineer training.
“You could see this haze in the sky toward Bay City and one of the guys in our car got on his cellphone and was told a gasoline tanker exploded in Bay City,” Comtois said.
“I would say for a disaster on the river, this ranks No. 1. During the lumber era, there were fires, but nothing that would even compare to what we had here with the Jupiter.”
Former Times photographer Wes Stafford received a call that Sunday morning from cops reporter Tim Younkman, who told him a boat had exploded on the Saginaw River.
“My first question was, ‘Do you think it’s still going to be burning when I get down there?’” Stafford said.
Younkman told him, “I think so.”
Two Times photographers were already at the scene, so Stafford was assigned to get aerial shots of the blaze in an airplane.
“That’s when it really struck me,” he said. “To see fire and smoke in the sky over Bay City was incredible.”
Before learning of the blast, Stafford said he heard a “scrunching, screeching” sound that resembled a train derailment.
“What I think I heard was the Jupiter’s deck being peeled back.”
Younkman, who had also covered the Wenonah Hotel fire in 1977, used his law enforcement sources to piece together what happened as other members of the newsroom were called in for assignments. Over the course of the week of the explosion, Times staff published 21 articles, 27 photos and 11 graphics in the newspaper about the Jupiter fire and cleanup.
“This was a spectacular fire as far as fires go,” Younkman said. “The Wenonah was the most tragic in that 10 people died. This fire, we had one man die, which was bad, but considering what happened, the fact anyone survived was a miracle.”
Remnants of the Jupiter remain in Bay County today.
A number of artifacts, including the Jupiter’s transom, fire bell and American flag that flew on its stern are on display at Dobson’s Antique Toy and Firehouse Museum in Bangor Township. The items are owned by the Saginaw River Marine Historical Society.
Those interested can also see a life jacket salvaged from the freighter, part of a work boat and an old gauge. Outside the firetruck museum, buried in the growth of weeds and trees, is the Jupiter’s mast. Amateur video of the response to the blaze runs on a loop inside the museum and several newspaper clippings are on display. A model replica of the freighter is encased in glass.
The Times’ comprehensive coverage of the explosion and investigation, in addition to the Marine accident report by the National Transportation Safety Board, can be found in the library at the Bay County Historical Museum.
A federal investigation ultimately found Total Petroleum Co. responsible for the fire because of faulty moorings. Throughout the investigation, some officials alleged the Buffalo was traveling at too high of a speed, causing a wake and suction that pulled the Jupiter away from its moorings.
The total cost of the fire, including the Jupiter’s value and overtime costs for local agencies was more than $6.1 million.
Today, Marathon Petroleum operates at the site at where the Jupiter was unloading gasoline. Ken Foster, a former manager at the plant who retired in 2011 and was on site the day the Jupiter exploded, said several training seminars, from firefighting to lifesaving, soon became standard protocol at the plant following the incident.
When freighters now pass by the gasoline terminal, for instance, all pumping operations are shut down until the vessel has cleared.
“The lessons we learned brought out a lot of good,” Foster said. “We learned an awful lot.”
