We use our own helicopters, TNI-AU (Air Forces) helicopters. Six helicopters are now heading for hereCilacap, C Java (ANTARA News) - A number of helicopters will be used to fight the fire at a Pertamina refinery tank in Cilacap, Central Java, a minister said.
"Efforts are being made to put it out from the air. Helicopters are leaving Jakarta for Cilacap," Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs Hatta Rajasa said here on Sunday.
He said the helicopters were not hired from Singapore. "We use our own helicopters, TNI-AU (Air Forces) helicopters. Six helicopters are now heading for here."
The helicopters would shoot foam to cool unburned tanks and localize the fire, he said.
A team of officers specializing in man-made rains would also get involved in the efforts to combat the fire, he said.
An explosion that set off the fire occurred at one of the tanks in the refinery early Saturday. The fire spread to a nearby tank after firefighters were unable to put out the fire by noon.
State oil and gas firm PT Pertamina on Saturday asked for tons of foam to be used to extinguish the fire at its Refinery Unit IV in Cilacap, Central Java.
"We have prepared 40 tons of foam and five tons of it will soon be sent from Jakarta. I hope it will be enough," Pertamina corporate secretary Hari Karyuliarto said on Saturday.
The foam would be dissolved in water around the location of the fire, he said adding another tank close to Tank 31 T-02 had also been burned due to strong winds.
"The burned tank is Tank 31-T03. The other two meanwhile have already been filled with foam," he said.
Asked about fuel supplies, Hatta said Pertamina had given the assurance that national fuel supplies would not be affected despite the fire.
"Once again, it is not a refinery that has caught fire. The Cilacap refinery will remain operational. The Cilacap refinery which is one of the refineries supplying fuel oils in the country will continue to work," he said.
Pertamina President Director Karen Agustiawan meanwhile said the company was still focusing on the effort to extinguish the fire.
The Forensic Laboratory Center would look into the cause of the fire after it had been extinguished, she said.
She said the refinery would continue its operations at normal levels. "As Pak (Mr.) Hatta has already stated, it is not the refinery but fuel oil accommodating tank that has caught fire. So the production will continue to run as usual," she said.(*)
Editor: Aditia Maruli Radja
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