A Gas Heist Gone Wrong(bloomberg.com)
bloomberg.com
A Gas Heist Gone Wrong
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-06-26/a-gas-heist-gone-wrong-an-explosion-and-137-deaths-in-mexico
53 comments
A great podcast episode on this is Planet Money's 'Mexico Fights The Fuel Pirates'; they explain how it all led up to this
https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2019/03/08/701613540/epis...
https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2019/03/08/701613540/epis...
Wow... that was a lot better than your average Planet Money segment.
Reminds me of the Zoolander gasoline fight: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTrxEQnPtAg
That's exactly what I was thinking when I read:
“People were fighting, others laughing, and most were drunk on the fumes. They were throwing gas at each other.”
It's amazing (and tragic) that people would do this in real life.
“People were fighting, others laughing, and most were drunk on the fumes. They were throwing gas at each other.”
It's amazing (and tragic) that people would do this in real life.
I can think of examples of "mass" misbehavior when I was younger:
- Camp councilors eating the freeze pops in the lunch freezer that were for the kids
- High schoolers eating all the candy in the vending machine when someone broke the glass
- A very large group of us went to a local restaurant. The next day we heard of a lot of people leaving without paying. (I left a lot of money before leaving, and told everyone I sat with to do the same too. Now that I'm older I'd at least track down our server and hand them money personally.)
In all cases, there's this weird thing that seemed to turn off in other peoples' heads. It's like all reason just goes away.
- Camp councilors eating the freeze pops in the lunch freezer that were for the kids
- High schoolers eating all the candy in the vending machine when someone broke the glass
- A very large group of us went to a local restaurant. The next day we heard of a lot of people leaving without paying. (I left a lot of money before leaving, and told everyone I sat with to do the same too. Now that I'm older I'd at least track down our server and hand them money personally.)
In all cases, there's this weird thing that seemed to turn off in other peoples' heads. It's like all reason just goes away.
Intoxication is a hell of a thing.
Version of story without a paywall: https://1stamendmentnews.org/2019/06/26/a-gas-heist-gone-wro...
You mean a stolen repost of the article?
Greed breeds corruption, corruption breeds poverty, poverty breeds lack of education, lack of education breeds stupidity.
It is the same if you replace the lack of education with despair..
It is the same if you replace the lack of education with despair..
LiveLeak has the footage of it exploding and before and after.
It's worth watching if your up to it but the footage of people escaping on fire is hard to handle.
But like all such things it is both informative and might help you handle similar situations such as a small gas fire.
https://www.liveleak.com/view?t=sLpTO_1547875958
It's worth watching if your up to it but the footage of people escaping on fire is hard to handle.
But like all such things it is both informative and might help you handle similar situations such as a small gas fire.
https://www.liveleak.com/view?t=sLpTO_1547875958
There was an article recently about how the drug cartels in Mexico pivoted into stealing gas. Much easier and less risky than drug trafficking.
This is why ending the war on drugs in US will not improve the Mexico violence problem much.
This is why ending the war on drugs in US will not improve the Mexico violence problem much.
Nonsense. It's orders of magnitude easier to protect a pipeline than to stop millions of people from engaging in secret commerce. You could secure that infrastructure with a mere tiny sliver of the tens of billions of dollars spent annually to fight the drug war.
Agreed. Cartels aren't run by idiots. There's a reason they didn't pivot years ago and it's not because stealing fuel was too easy/lucrative.
Removing one revenue source might help... Even just reducing it.
Obviously, no single thing will fix it, and whatever you do it'll take a long time.
Economic opportunities might be just as important too.
Obviously, no single thing will fix it, and whatever you do it'll take a long time.
Economic opportunities might be just as important too.
Just getting rid of the guns for drugs trade would eliminate a lot of Mexico’s violence: Mexico’s gun production is trifling compared to the USA, they would be underwater on gun violence without that illicit trade link.
Like a Hydra: Once you caught off one head from the beast, three more appear.
The gas theft is just a way to reduce the risk of drug trafficking. The drugs make far more money than theft or kidnapping.
the war on drugs should have been aborted years ago. If that had been done, there would not be any gangs blowing up pipelines today.
We haven’t fought any drug wars in Venezuela, and they have routine gas theft, including tanker truck hijackings. It sounds more like economic causes than “the US did it!”
Gas theft is rampant in a number of countries that are not meaningfully part of the US war on drugs as they are not on shipping / growing routes.
While less critical than the injuries, there is often significant environmental impact in the cruder cases of pipeline theft. There also ends up being some pretty bad behavior by the private security / mercenaries hired to try and protect some of the infrastructure.
Clean goverment, effective law enforcement, pro-social behaviors and economic improvements etc all might reduce some of these issues.
While less critical than the injuries, there is often significant environmental impact in the cruder cases of pipeline theft. There also ends up being some pretty bad behavior by the private security / mercenaries hired to try and protect some of the infrastructure.
Clean goverment, effective law enforcement, pro-social behaviors and economic improvements etc all might reduce some of these issues.
And we certainly have never interfered in any economic sense in Venezuela ... hold on, my producer is telling me that this is incorrect.
Elaborate?
This type of sarcasm adds nothing and is noise compared to you just making your simple counter-assertion.
No need to dress it up in extraneous LARPing where you have a producer.
No need to dress it up in extraneous LARPing where you have a producer.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States%E2%80%93Venezuel...
Hugo Chavez's rise was definitely a response to US (and other powers) involvement in Latin America. The US did not "do it" (where it is directly causing gas theft). There is more to the history in South America and directly inside Venezuela and what the US was doing.
These issues are much more complicated than "the US never sent troops to Venezuela to fight against drug dealers..."
[edit]: removed assertion that parent was purposefully ignoring history. That was my assumption, not what they said.
Hugo Chavez's rise was definitely a response to US (and other powers) involvement in Latin America. The US did not "do it" (where it is directly causing gas theft). There is more to the history in South America and directly inside Venezuela and what the US was doing.
These issues are much more complicated than "the US never sent troops to Venezuela to fight against drug dealers..."
[edit]: removed assertion that parent was purposefully ignoring history. That was my assumption, not what they said.
Venezuela is a narco state[0], but it wont be till this is in every media outlet that anything will be done about it.
[0]: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/17/venezuelan-vic...
[0]: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/17/venezuelan-vic...
[deleted]
Did a kid get shot for seeing too much ?
This is what happens when you take a story, in this case gangs and cartels stealing gasoline from pipelines, and add a human interest element that has nothing to do with the story. In this case, that is a group of locals taking gas spewing from a broken pipeline and being killed or injured by the explosion.
I'm pretty sure the story here is how 137 people died in a gas explosion in Mexico (plus probably hundreds injured for life), including some backstory as to why that explosion happened.
> The Mendoza sisters, however, say seeking out a guilty party is a low priority for them, at least for now. They’re trying to survive the consequences of the fire and get used to the idea of being alone in Hidalgo.
> The Mendoza sisters, however, say seeking out a guilty party is a low priority for them, at least for now. They’re trying to survive the consequences of the fire and get used to the idea of being alone in Hidalgo.
Fortunately, that is the story. But the headline makes it sound like the accident in particular was due to a heist. This implying an organized effort to steal gas. But as the precious poster mentioned, this was a broken line that locals just started showing up to in order to take advantage of the free money.
It wasn't a broken line, it was a botched tap job. I don't see a lot of moral difference between an organized heist and an impromptu opportunistic criminal mob, except that the former has the decency to not get children involved.
"The scene in the green alfalfa field abutting the pipeline appeared to be a free-for-all, roughly 80 villagers swarming a leak inside a 100-foot-long, 5-foot-deep irrigation trench that bisected the field. There seemed to be no organization, no tap, no hose—only two holes in the pipe, which made the fuel spurt as if from a wonky fountain. It seemed possible a local huachicol gang had screwed up the extraction, but the holes had none of the typical hallmarks."
There's no description or picture of the pipe, other than that and the photo captioned, "Survivors have erected a memorial at the site of the fire." Similar pipes get punctured by farm equipment fairly routinely; there's no reason to believe this was a criminal tap rather than an accident that the local people tried to take advantage of.
What I suspect Bloomberg wants is an article about the evils of gasoline thieves and they're sticking the human interest story to that to get attention.
There's no description or picture of the pipe, other than that and the photo captioned, "Survivors have erected a memorial at the site of the fire." Similar pipes get punctured by farm equipment fairly routinely; there's no reason to believe this was a criminal tap rather than an accident that the local people tried to take advantage of.
What I suspect Bloomberg wants is an article about the evils of gasoline thieves and they're sticking the human interest story to that to get attention.
The article seemed very sympathetic to the people killed and injured to me, giving multiple accounts from their perspective and that of their families, etc. But this is the equivalent, at best, of a crowd descending on a crashed Brinks truck to snatch up spilled cash and then having the armored car's fuel tank explode on them. They subjected themselves to extraordinary danger to take what didn't belong to them and paid the price for it. I'd consider the moral ledger to be balanced.
Except the gas that was spilling out of the pipe was never going to be recovered and used for anything else - nothing of value was being stolen. For people in extreme poverty, the money they gain from gas could significantly affect their lives, I don't blame them for trying to take it.
Oh I don't blame them for trying either. I do blame them for bringing children and getting them killed.
"A typical huachicoleo involves two or three people soldering and tapping the pipe and a group of halcones, or hawks, keeping watch. The solderer and his teammates use high-power drills to perforate the pipes, then affix taps and sometimes a hose to retrieve as much fuel as their portable tank can carry, generally into the hundreds or thousands of gallons. [...] Generally, these extractions, or tomas clandestinas, are coordinated operations run by gangs in the dead of night."
That doesn't sound like it has anything to do with the incident where 137 people died.
"Huachicoleo is becoming one of Mexico’s most pressing economic issues. In 2018 thieves made off with about $3 billion in gas from 12,500 siphonings, almost double the number of thefts of two years earlier. The motive comes down to math. “Most people here earn around 1,500 pesos [$78] a week in a normal job, but by doing this you can get your hands on 2,000 pesos a night for being a hawk and up to 15,000 pesos for being the one who solders the tap,” the Hidalgo huachicolero says. “In an area where people were not long ago riding donkeys, they now have fancy cars.” He and other gang members say a night’s worth of stolen fuel, sold on the black market, can net their bosses roughly $46,000 in profit."
Which means all that has nothing to do with the story, right?
That doesn't sound like it has anything to do with the incident where 137 people died.
"Huachicoleo is becoming one of Mexico’s most pressing economic issues. In 2018 thieves made off with about $3 billion in gas from 12,500 siphonings, almost double the number of thefts of two years earlier. The motive comes down to math. “Most people here earn around 1,500 pesos [$78] a week in a normal job, but by doing this you can get your hands on 2,000 pesos a night for being a hawk and up to 15,000 pesos for being the one who solders the tap,” the Hidalgo huachicolero says. “In an area where people were not long ago riding donkeys, they now have fancy cars.” He and other gang members say a night’s worth of stolen fuel, sold on the black market, can net their bosses roughly $46,000 in profit."
Which means all that has nothing to do with the story, right?
I don't think a broken pipeline is the case -- unlike our pipelines, these ones are buried several feet underground. Pipelines don't just unearth themselves: someone deliberately dug out and punctured it, in an attempt to steal gas.
Ever seen those "Dial before you dig" signs?
The article obviously doesn't provide everything we need to know to conclude that it was an act of crime, but that doesn't mean that it's impossible to know.
A small bit of information about what's growing on the field (alfalfa), the date it happened and what farm equipment are generally used at the time would make it pretty easy to conclude.
So just because you're not convinced doesn't mean they aren't right.
A small bit of information about what's growing on the field (alfalfa), the date it happened and what farm equipment are generally used at the time would make it pretty easy to conclude.
So just because you're not convinced doesn't mean they aren't right.
I'm not sure I understand the point you're making?
Worth remembering Mexico nationalized gas, leading to gas shortages, rationing - and higher prices.
That seems like a un-nuanced generalization of Mexico and it's politics. Saudi Arabia has nationalized gas and has no shortage and low prices.
Saudi Arabia's subsidy of gas prices likely results in either unsustainable economic performance without oil revenue and/or a total lack of value for fuel efficiency = environment impact.
They are having some actual success reforming in this area - http://www.arabnews.com/node/1353116
They are having some actual success reforming in this area - http://www.arabnews.com/node/1353116
I'm just relaying the sense I get from all of my Mexican friends, and studying their culture and history. Their government is unbelievably corrupt and under-performing - and insofar as they've nationalized the provision of gas, yes I expect their government to be less reliant than private&international companies.
Mexico nationalized the petroleum industry... in 1938 [0].
Are you talking about something else?
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petroleum_industry_in_Mexico
Are you talking about something else?
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petroleum_industry_in_Mexico
Worth debunking that, as:
a) Mexico nationalized gas on 1938.
b) Fuel shortage and price hike actually started on 2016 when the previous right wing government deregulated the gas price, and allowed other companies to sell fuel in a free market scheme.
Panic sales as everyone was expecting a price hike were the cause of fuel shortages across 2016 and 2017.
While the current government has currently halted the privatization process for PEMEX, based on allegations of corruption and dirty business; the fuel shortage was (at least the official story) because of an operation to stop fuel theft, again with allegations of complicity of previous governments.
a) Mexico nationalized gas on 1938.
b) Fuel shortage and price hike actually started on 2016 when the previous right wing government deregulated the gas price, and allowed other companies to sell fuel in a free market scheme.
Panic sales as everyone was expecting a price hike were the cause of fuel shortages across 2016 and 2017.
While the current government has currently halted the privatization process for PEMEX, based on allegations of corruption and dirty business; the fuel shortage was (at least the official story) because of an operation to stop fuel theft, again with allegations of complicity of previous governments.
It's hard for me to see PEMEX as a noble venture when price controls on gas largely act as a subsidy for the richest in Mexican society. I would blame less on "right wing deregulation" and more on a system that is rotten to the core and failing at such a basic service like providing fuel.
>It's hard for me to see PEMEX as a noble venture when price controls on gas largely act as a subsidy for the richest in Mexican society.
Kinda like every other subsidy in a capitalist society.
>I would blame less on "right wing deregulation"
And that's called being blind by ideology.
Having a pro-market stance is respectable position. Being blind to our ideology shortcommings is less than ideal but normal. Trying to rewrite history to fit our own ideology either by mistake or willingly, is being a propagandist.
Kinda like every other subsidy in a capitalist society.
>I would blame less on "right wing deregulation"
And that's called being blind by ideology.
Having a pro-market stance is respectable position. Being blind to our ideology shortcommings is less than ideal but normal. Trying to rewrite history to fit our own ideology either by mistake or willingly, is being a propagandist.
s/Mexico/Saudi Arabia/
Or, effectively, most other petro states. At the very least, the leading petroleum venture is a public-private hybrid.
Petro-state political economy is a strange, fire-breathing, beast.
Or, effectively, most other petro states. At the very least, the leading petroleum venture is a public-private hybrid.
Petro-state political economy is a strange, fire-breathing, beast.
Maybe the answer is herd following behavior. A few oblivious people go into the danger zone, and the less oblivious think maybe they know a reason why it isn't dangerous and I shouldn't miss out. It's a human variation of the myth of lemmings jumping off cliffs, but less mythical.