Most Recent in Texas Politics:

1For Greg Abbott, All the Border’s a Stage

2How Far Can Texas Democrats Take the Quorum Break?

3After Kelcy Warren’s Energy Transfer Partners Made Billions from the Deadly Texas Blackouts, He Gave $1 Million to Greg Abbott

4Texas House Republicans Vote to Track Down Absent Democrats and Arrest Them If Necessary

5Greg Abbott’s Summer Special Session Sideshow

6Texans With Disabilities Fear Voting Will Get Harder for Them as Special Session on GOP Restrictions Nears

Most Recent in Environment:

1Battleground Plant

2In West Texas, Astronomers Worry About Growing Oilfield Light Pollution

3After Kelcy Warren’s Energy Transfer Partners Made Billions from the Deadly Texas Blackouts, He Gave $1 Million to Greg Abbott

4Communities of Color in Houston Will Face Another Hurricane Season Without Adequate Flood Control

5“People Are Wiped Out”: Costs Pile Up as Hurricane Season Begins

6In the Drill Zone, Children’s Health Is Looking Bleak

Most Recent in Border:

1For Greg Abbott, All the Border’s a Stage

2Moments From the Reopening of Balmorhea Pool

3Undocumented Immigrants Continue to Be Expelled From the U.S. Under Title 42 COVID-19 Measures

4Follow the Money

5Siguiendo La Ruta Del Dinero

6Texas Activists Took Their Fight Against a Natural Gas Project Abroad—And They’re Winning

Most Recent in Criminal Justice:

1In Memory of Santos Rodriguez

2Home, But Not Free: NSA Whistleblower Reality Winner Adjusts to Her Release From Prison

3A Wrongful Execution in Texas Points to the Fallibility of the Death Penalty

4Mentally Ill and Sentenced to Death

5An Irreversible Sentence

6Yet Again, Texas Lawmakers Face Crisis Conditions in Texas Prisons

Most Recent in Education:

1Resignation Letter

2The Unlikely Demise of Texas’ Biggest Corporate Tax Break

3Texas Educators Worry Bill Limiting the Teaching of Current Events and Historic Racism Would “Whitewash History”

4‘I Felt Like They Were Demonizing My People’: Advocates and Families Point to Biases in Texas Curricula

5The Long, Winding Road that Led to the SBOE’s Decision for Texas Schools to Teach Abstinence-Plus Sex Education

6Efforts to Save What’s Left of Mary Allen Seminary Reveal The Challenges of Preserving Black Placemaking in Texas

Most Recent in Health Care:

1Texas Veterans Homes Overseen by George P. Bush Were Often the Deadliest Places to Be During COVID-19 Pandemic

2The People’s Scientist

3Profit Before Patient

4Texas Expands Access to Medical Cannabis—But Advocates Say It’s Not Enough

5In the Drill Zone, Children’s Health Is Looking Bleak

6Editorial: Even ‘Turning Texas Blue’ Won’t Fix Us If We Don’t Face Some Hard Truths

Most Recent in The Interview:

1Researcher Howard Henderson on Reimagining Policing in the U.S.

2Texas Observer Founding Editor Ronnie Dugger Reflects on 65 Years of Publication

3How Katharine Hayhoe Stays Hopeful as the Planet Warms

4Author William Lopez on How Immigration Raids Inflict Long-Lasting Trauma

5Why a Texas Gun Control Activist is Optimistic About the Chances for Reform

6American Health Care is Broken, Especially in Texas. What Can We Do About It?

Most Recent in Books:

1In ‘Al Norte,’ a Through Line of Transience That Is Still True Today

2A Feminist Rewrite of Lot

3‘Forget the Alamo’ Unravels a Texas History Made of Myths, or Rather, Lies

4‘On Juneteenth’ Refuses Easy Answers About the Importance of People of Color to Texas History

5‘Leaving Isn’t the Hardest Thing’ Tours Dark Places That Are Hard to Call Home

6Jung Young Moon’s Strange Novels Cross Continents

Most Recent in Features:

1How to Die in Texas

2Young Texans Keep Spelling Bees Going From Home

4San Antonio Embraces Mandaean Refugees

5The Ghosts of Jefferson

6Little Arthouse on the Prairie

Most Recent in Essay:

1Battleground Plant

2An Irreversible Sentence

3Editorial: Look Down Ballot for Democratic Wins in Texas

4What the Black Lives Matter Protests Mean for East Texas

5Raise a Glass to the Class of COVID-19

6What’s a Bookstore for?

Most Recent in Eye on Texas:

1Eye on Texas: The Essential Women of Austin

2Eye on Texas: A House Divided

3Eye on Texas: The Black Yearbook

4Eye on Texas: Border Tuner

5Eye on Texas: The Broken Wheel Ranch Project

6Eye on Texas: Spike Johnston

Most Recent in Poetry:

1Poem: ‘Late Night at the Lege’

2‘My Cousin Dies, Like a Deer, On the Side of the Road’

3Poet Claudia Delfina Cardona on Her Debut Poetry Chapbook

4Author Saeed Jones on Empathy, the Power of Memoir, and Growing up Gay in North Texas

5Remembering W.S. Merwin, Honorary Texan

6Lost in Limbo in the Hays County Jail

Articles tagged: West

by Priscila Mosqueda

Report: Firefighter Deaths at West Fertilizer Plant Disaster Could Have Been Prevented

Fri, May 16, 2014 |

The State Fire Marhsal's Office reports that the deaths of 10 volunteer firefighters who perished in the West fertilizer plant disaster in April 2013 were preve...Read More

Members of the West Volunteer Fire Department proceed to a memorial in Waco on April 25, 2013, for victims of the West explosion.

by Jonathan McNamara

Observer Radio Episode 54: Lingering Questions From West, Texas

Fri, Apr 18, 2014 |

We discuss the one-year anniversary of the West fertilizer plant disaster and what is being done (and not done) to prevent it from happening again....Read More

by Jonathan McNamara

Recovery: West, Texas Rebuilds

Thu, Apr 17, 2014 |

Today is the one-year anniversary of the fertilizer plant explosion in the small town of West, Texas, which killed 15 people and injured an estimated 300....Read More

by Priscila Mosqueda

Hero Complex

Last year was the deadliest on record for Texas firefighters. Can dampening a culture of heroism keep them safer?

Tue, Apr 1, 2014 |

Last year was the deadliest on record for Texas firefighters. Can dampening a culture of heroism keep them safer?...Read More

by Forrest Wilder

Inspections Show Texas Fertilizer Plants Still Vulnerable

Thu, Feb 27, 2014 |

Nearly a year after the West fertilizer plant explosion, holes in the system that allowed it to happen in the first place have not been addressed. ...Read More

Duke

by Alex Hannaford

Rescue Dogs: The Canines and Their Handlers Who Search the Aftermath of Catastrophe

Fri, Sep 20, 2013 |

Texas Task Force II currently has four dog handlers. Five more, currently in training, will join the team later this year. All are taught to find survivors. ...Read More

Aerial photo of the West explosion site taken several days after blast.

by Priscila Mosqueda and Forrest Wilder

State Agencies Meet Resistance in Policing Fertilizer Industry

Mon, Aug 26, 2013 |

In the aftermath of the West, Texas fertilizer disaster, state agencies meet resistance from other fertilizer facilities....Read More

by Forrest Wilder

The Lessons from West

Mon, Aug 19, 2013 |

I think it’s clear that West wasn’t an unavoidable act of God. It was a man-made industrial crime....Read More

by Forrest Wilder

Conservative Think Tanker Proposes Tax Cuts to Pay for West Disaster

Fri, Aug 2, 2013 |

Texas Public Policy Foundation deep thinker John Davidson proposes tax cuts for businesses to help West, Texas recover from the April fertilizer explosion....Read More

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