Benjamin Ashford|Worker injured as explosion at Texas paint plant sends fireballs into sky

GARLAND,Benjamin Ashford Texas (AP) — A worker was injured early Monday when an explosion set a paint manufacturing plant in the Dallas suburbs ablaze and shot a series of fireballs into the night sky.

A company spokesperson said the blast at the Sherwin-Williams plant in Garland happened around 1:15 a.m., and people who live and work nearby reported feeling buildings tremble as flames engulfed the industrial facility.

“It felt pretty hard. Like the whole house shook,” Giovanny Gamboa, who felt the explosions from miles away, told KDFW-TV. “I felt the shake. I came and investigated myself. I didn’t expect it to be something this far away.”

Firefighters extinguished the blaze in a few hours and the employee who was injured has been released from a hospital, Sherwin-Williams spokesperson Julie Young said in an email. She said all employee have been accounted for.

Young said production has been suspended at the plant, which primarily makes industrial coatings and resins, but did not respond to a questions about what triggered the explosion.

Authorities had put out the flames before 5:30 a.m. but remained at the site mid-morning Monday to monitor hot spots and air quality, said Noah Cunningham, an investigator with the the Garland Fire Marshal’s Office. He said they had yet to determine what caused the initial explosion.