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Kum & Go Issues Public Safety Alert

DES MOINES -- A delivery person accidentally filled a kerosene storage tank with gasoline at a Kum & Go convenience store in Winterset, Iowa, prompting officials to try and find the customers who bought the volatile mixture, the Des Moines Register reported.

Customers can buy kerosene at the pump, according to Meggan Kring, Kum & Go spokeswoman. About 50 to 70 gallons of the gasoline-kerosene mixture were sold at the store. The mixture was half gas and half kerosene. She said 12 of the 13 customers who bought the mixture have been found, according to the report.

The error occurred Friday and was discovered Monday afternoon during a routine check of fuel levels at the Winterset store. Kring said the company immediately notified Winterset firefighters and Madison County Emergency Management.

Kum & Go proceeded to check kerosene supplies at all locations and later reported that the problem occurred only at the Winterset store, the newspaper reported.
"My biggest concern was with kerosene space heaters used to heat homes and buildings," Todd Brown, coordinator with Madison County Emergency Management, told the Des Moines Register. "This is a much more flammable mixture than those heaters are designed to handle. There is much more risk of fire or even explosion."

Some 5,715 residents whose phone numbers and e-mail addresses are listed with emergency management were notified by way of a Code Red emergency alert system. Brown said 4,522 contacts were made via text messages, e-mails and phone calls.

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