Soviet Admit Blast at Chemical Plant, Deny Rocket Fuel Link

MOSCOW —  The Soviet Union acknowledged today that something exploded at one of its chemical factories last week, killing three people and injuring five, but denied U.S. claims that the explosive substance was rocket fuel used for a new long-range nuclear missile.

Gennady I. Gerasimov, Foreign Ministry spokesman, said the blast occurred May 12 in a storage area of the plant at Pavlograd, about 500 miles southwest of Moscow in the Ukraine.

He said the chemicals involved were explosives used in civilian industry, not fuel for the new SS-24 intercontinental ballistic missile.

“There was no missile fuel or rockets involved,” Gerasimov told Reuters by telephone.

In Washington, U.S. defense officials maintained that the huge explosion had destroyed the Soviet Union’s only production line for the main motor of its new rail-mounted SS-24 nuclear missile.

They told Reuters that the accident occurred at a solid-rocket propellant plant and will delay SS-24 production for at least six months but will not weaken Soviet nuclear forces.

“It was a hell of an explosion. All that’s left of one building at the plant is a hole in the ground. Another building was also damaged,” one of the officials, who asked not to be identified, said.