It wasn’t immediately clear what chemicals erupted into the air from the Channelview fire. The most anyone knew was that the large plume of black smoke billowing across the late afternoon sky — visible for miles just east of Houston — had triggered evacuations and a shelter-in-place for the nearby community of Lakeside Park Estates.
Only later, after the fire had burned for more than two hours, did residents learn what had happened. In early April 2021, an accident at K-Solv, a chemical distribution and maritime services company, started a chemical fire that sent more than 165,000 pounds of 43 different pollutants into the atmosphere, including several known to be hazardous to human health. The company then failed to notify the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality within 24 hours after the emissions event — a requirement under state law.
