Case study and lessons learned from the ammonium nitrate explosion at the West Fertilizer facility
| Autor: | William Pittman, Zhe Han, Alba Pineda, M. Sam Mannan, Delphine Laboureur, Camilo Rosas, Jiaojun Jiang, Brian Z. Harding |
|---|---|
| Rok vydání: | 2016 |
| Předmět: |
021110 strategic
defence & security studies Environmental Engineering Injury control Accident prevention business.industry Health Toxicology and Mutagenesis 0211 other engineering and technologies Poison control 02 engineering and technology engineering.material Pollution Emergency response 020401 chemical engineering engineering Forensic engineering Chemical storage Environmental Chemistry Fertilizer 0204 chemical engineering Consequence analysis business Waste Management and Disposal Environmental planning |
| Zdroj: | Journal of Hazardous Materials. 308:164-172 |
| ISSN: | 0304-3894 |
| DOI: | 10.1016/j.jhazmat.2016.01.039 |
| Popis: | In West, Texas on April 17, 2013, a chemical storage and distribution facility caught fire followed by the explosion of around 30 tons of ammonium nitrate while the emergency responders were trying to extinguish the fire, leading to 15 fatalities and numerous buildings, businesses and homes destroyed or damaged. This incident resulted in devastating consequences for the community around the facility, and shed light on a need to improve the safety management of local small businesses similar to the West facility. As no official report on the findings of the incident has been released yet, this article first investigates the root causes of the incident, and presents a simplified consequence analysis. The article reviews the regulations applicable to this type of facility and recommended emergency response procedures to identify gaps between what happened in West and the current regulations, and discusses how the current regulations could be modified to prevent or minimize future losses. Finally, the federal response that followed the incident until the publication of this paper is summarized. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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