Blast at a Tennessee explosives plant leaves 19 people missing and feared dead, sheriff says

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McEWEN, Tenn. (AP) — A blast that leveled an explosives plant Friday in rural Tennessee left 19 people missing and feared dead, authorities said.

Humphreys County Sheriff Chris Davis said the blast at Accurate Energetic Systems, which supplies the military, was one of the worst scenes he’s ever seen. He said multiple people were killed but declined to say how many, referring to the 19 missing as “souls” because officials were still speaking to family.

“There’s nothing to describe. It’s gone,” Davis said of the building.

The blast occurred about 7:45 a.m., Davis said, with aerial footage by WTVF-TV showing the smoldering hilltop facility and the burnt-out shells of vehicles.

People reported hearing and feeling the explosion from miles away. The company’s website says it processes explosives and ammunition at an eight-building facility that sprawls across wooded hills in the Bucksnort area, about 60 miles (97 kilometers) southwest of Nashville.

Davis said investigators are trying to determine what happened and couldn't say what caused the explosion. Emergency crews were initially unable to enter the plant because of continuing detonations, Hickman County Advanced EMT David Stewart said by phone.

By Friday afternoon, there was no further danger of explosions, and the scene was under control, according to Grey Collier, a spokesperson for the Humphreys County Emergency Management Agency.

Accurate Energetic Systems, based in nearby McEwen, did not immediately respond to a phone message seeking comment Friday morning.

Accurate Energetic Systems has been awarded numerous military contracts, largely by the U.S. Army and Navy, to supply different types of munitions and explosives, according to public records. The products ranged from bulk explosives to landmines and small breaching charges, including C4.

When the explosion occurred, residents in Lobelville, a 20-minute drive from the scene, said they felt their homes shake and some people captured the loud boom of the explosion on their home cameras.

The blast rattled Gentry Stover from his sleep.

“I thought the house had collapsed with me inside of it,” he said by phone. “I live very close to Accurate and I realized about 30 seconds after I woke up that it had to have been that.”

State Rep. Jody Barrett, a Republican from the neighboring town of Dickson, was worried about the possible economic impact because the plant is a key employer in the area.

“We live probably 15 miles as the crow flies and we absolutely heard it at the house,” Barrett said. “It sounded like something going through the roof of our house.”

The U.S. has a long history of deadly incident at workplaces, including the Monongah coal mine explosion that killed 362 men and boys in West Virginia in 1907. Several high-profile industrial accidents in the 1960s led President Richard Nixon to sign a another law creating the Occupational Safety and Health Administration the next year.

In 2019, Accurate Energetic Systems faced several small fines from the U.S. Department of Labor for violations of policies meant to protect workers from exposure to hazardous chemicals, radiation and other irritants, according to citations from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

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Associated Press writers Sarah Brumfield, in Cockeysville, Maryland; Hannah Schoenbaum, in Salt Lake City; Kathy McCormack in Concord, New Hampshire; and Kimberlee Kruesi in Providence, Rhode Island, contributed to this report.