Blast at oil refinery near Lake Superior impacts Cook County roads

The Twin Ports area of Lake Superior made national headlines in late April when a series of explosions and intense fire erupted at the Husky Energy oil refinery in Superior, Wisc.

Located about 115 miles from Grand Marais, news of the incident spread quickly up the North Shore, including the fact some residents of Superior had to evacuate their homes as a result of the fire and potentially hazardous material in the air and water resulting from the blast. 

Months later, the bad news continues to pour out from the incident, and now it’s reaching Cook County. The local highway department, which purchased oil from the refinery, will not be able to move forward with paving the Mineral Center Road in 2018 as originally planned. This is a direct result of the incident at Husky Energy as it is now more expensive to get paving materials for local road projects.

WTIP’s Joe Friedrichs spoke with Cook County Highway Engineer Krysten Foster about this situation.