UPDATE 2-Explosion at MOL's Tiszaujvaros petrochemical plant in Hungary kills one

An explosion at ‌Hungarian oil and ​gas group MOL's petrochemical plant in Tiszaujvaros, eastern Hungary, has killed one person and injured several others, the company said in ‌a statement on Friday. The Olefin 1 plant is a steam cracker unit at MOL's petrochemical plant in Tiszaujvaros.

An explosion at ‌Hungarian oil and ​gas group MOL's petrochemical plant in Tiszaujvaros, eastern Hungary, has killed one person and injured several others, the company said in ‌a statement on Friday. Prime Minister Peter Magyar said in a Facebook post that his economy minister Istvan Kapitany and MOL's executive chairman Zsolt Hernadi were en route to the plant. Magyar ‌also posted a photo that showed huge black smoke billowing out of the plant.

"An explosion ‌occurred at MOL Petrochemicals' site in Tiszaújváros during the restart of the Olefin 1 plant. The fire was localised by firefighters, and the intervention is still ongoing," MOL said. "The circumstances of the accident are being investigated ⁠by experts," the ​company added, without ⁠giving further details.

MOL shares were down 1.9%, underperforming the wider market in Budapest. Kapitany said on Facebook that according ⁠to current information, a compressor exploded during the restart of the Olefin 1 plant and the fire was ​still being put out.

In a separate post, he said that among the injured, ⁠one person had suffered life-threatening respiratory burns and seven people suffered minor burns. He said the injured were transported to ⁠hospitals ​in the nearby cities of Debrecen and Miskolc. The Olefin 1 plant is a steam cracker unit at MOL's petrochemical plant in Tiszaujvaros. The production capacity of MOL's Olefin-1 plant is ⁠approximately 370,000 metric tons of ethylene per year. There are two steam crackers in Tiszaujvaros with ⁠660 kt/y ethylene ⁠capacity according to MOL's own website.

MOL uses the majority of its ethylene internally to manufacture polyethylene plastics, which are sold to the plastics and ‌packaging industries.