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The first Anhydrous Tank

thcri

Gone But Not Forgotten
did explode. Can't find the article now but they figured anyone within 250 yards of the exploded tank would be killed. Anyone up to 600 yards could be severly injured. I worked with Anhydrous Ammonia for about 5 years and believe it. I am out of town but my son said the first tank blew and they expect the others to go. The firemen were removed before the tank went.

St Charles Minnesota


Post Bulletin

The Rochester Fire Department chemical assessment team was called to the scene over concerns about anhydrous ammonia in the plant. There are 30,000 pounds of ammonia in a total of five tanks inside the building, Koverman said.


The whole town was evacuated just after lunch today
 

thcri

Gone But Not Forgotten
Anything within a 250 yard radius will be injured or killed and anything within 300-400 yard radius could get very sick from the chemical fumes.

I was wrong in my first post and this was from one of the comments.
 

thcri

Gone But Not Forgotten
Rochester is about 15 miles, I am about 25 from my house. The City of St Charles completely emptied their water towers and they were hauling water from nearby towns of about 5 and ten miles away each. There was 8 fire departments there as of this afternoon.

I was on the road and you could see the smoke from Rochester
 

Big Dog

Large Member
Staff member
GOLD Site Supporter
I was known as Mr. Ammonia in my last position. Not only was I the training coordinator but I was the SCR program/project engineer. Anhydrous (pure ammonia) is just one of the forms of ammonia they use in SCR's (Selective Catalytic Reduction) systems power plants use in Nitrogen Oxide (smog) emission removal. We had 4 tanks that held 1,000,000 pounds (approximately 200,000 gallons) of anhydrous.

It's pretty hard to catch it on fire, oxygen and temperature have to be within a very small range and specific concentrations for it to ignite. Ammonia attacks water for dilution. It takes 10 gallon of water to dissipate 1 gallon of ammonia. It's gonna be a long battle.
 

waybomb

Well-known member
GOLD Site Supporter
Freeport LA (I think that was the city), 70s or 80s maybe, 1,000,000 gallon tank of NH3 ruptured. Fireman were out in a boat in the liquid NH3. IIAR has videos of it. I got to visit a failed valve incident at a bewery in Baltimore. Some maroon installed a brass valve at the bottom of a receiver in a depression in the floor.

Once the ammonia was pumped out of the hole, the first person down had his boots stuck to the floor becausethe floor was so cold.

Neat stuff.
 

Deadly Sushi

The One, The Only, Sushi
SUPER Site Supporter
Freeport LA (I think that was the city), 70s or 80s maybe, 1,000,000 gallon tank of NH3 ruptured. Fireman were out in a boat in the liquid NH3. IIAR has videos of it. I got to visit a failed valve incident at a bewery in Baltimore. Some maroon installed a brass valve at the bottom of a receiver in a depression in the floor.

Once the ammonia was pumped out of the hole, the first person down had his boots stuck to the floor becausethe floor was so cold.

Neat stuff.

what wrong with brass? :unsure:
 

waybomb

Well-known member
GOLD Site Supporter
NH3 corrodes brass. Rather quickly.

Something like NH3 + Brass = leak

maybe some chemistry person could elaborate why. But my equation above is valid
 
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