Blood in the Water is centered around a jail explosion. It’s a fictionalized version of when Escambia County’s Central Booking and Detention exploded in 2014.
On April 29, 2014, the Pensacola area received torrential rainfall that flooded the CBD basement for the second time in the two years. The video showed at 2:15 a.m. on April 30 that the clothes dryers in the basement had pulled away from the wall in the basement and were floating. At 11:15 p.m. that night, an unknown source spark ignited the natural gas causing an explosion that destroyed the building, killed two prisoners, paralyzed a guard and injured 200 other inmates and guards.
Despite reports from inmates and staff to jail supervisors and maintenance employees, Pensacola Energy was never called about the gas odor. A county maintenance employee shut off nearby propane tanks, but they were not in use or even connected to the CBD. Records showed that the volumes in the propane tanks were the same before and after the flooding, while Pensacola Energy’s records showed a spike.
Though county mishandled the natural gas leak, a state grand jury determined that criminal charges were not appropriate. No one was fired for the explosion, but the county did settle several lawsuits tied to the blast.