Kingman explosion

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The Kingman Explosion , also known as the Doxol Disaster , occurred on July 5, 1973 in Kingman , Arizona , USA . The explosion of a tank car filled with liquid propane killed eleven firefighters and an employee of the gas company and injured around 100 people. In addition, there was major property damage from the pressure wave and subsequent fires. It was the most casualty fire department accident in Arizona until the 2013 Yarnell Hill Fire when 19 firefighters were killed.

The Kingman tragedy serves as a classic example of training for fire departments around the world and shaped the future designation of such incidents as Boiling Liquid Expanding Vapor Explosion (BLEVE) .

Course of events

The tank car with a capacity of almost 127,000 liters, standing on a siding on the Santa Fe Railroad at the Doxol Gas Western Energy Company , was to be transferred to fixed storage tanks using hoses on July 5, 1973. The car was exposed to the blazing sun for about a month and the transfer attempt was unusual at a midday temperature of 105 ° F (40.5 ° C).

When trying to correct a leak in the car's connections, escaping gas ignited and blew the flames in a V-shape almost 25 meters into the air for minutes. Eyewitnesses reported a sound similar to a plane taking off. The Kingman Fire Department was not equipped for such a case and therefore tried to cool the tank car with water to prevent pressure build-up inside. The flames were sucked back into the car three times and then shot out again before the tank car exploded around 20 minutes later and tore a three-meter-deep crater into the ground.

Debris and flames shot over 600 meters in all directions. Among other things, a two-ton wagon piece was found 400 meters from the explosion site. The explosion itself was still felt 8 km away. The pressure wave and the fire caused severe damage and subsequent fires in the area. A gas station, a tire company and a restaurant were totally destroyed.

Over 100 people were taken to the local hospital with burn injuries. With only one ambulance available, most of the injured had to be transported in police or private vehicles. In addition, fire-fighting planes from the Land Administration Office and helicopters from the police and army were used to fight the fire and transport the injured. Some of the victims were flown to the hospitals in Phoenix and Las Vegas . The high number of injuries resulted from the fact that a large number of onlookers had gathered on Route 66 , only 180 meters away . The police were still busy setting up roadblocks at the time. The explosion occurred before people could be moved outside a larger security area.

Three of the firefighters who were deployed died on the spot, eight more in the hospital in the following days. The Firefighters Memorial Park in Kingman commemorates the victims . In addition, one of the employees of the gas company who was on the tank car was killed by the escape of the flame.

Effects

The damage caused was put at over a million US dollars . With the death of eleven firefighters, the tragedy became the most casualty fire department accident in the history of Arizona and led to an increase in safety precautions for the transport and handling of liquid gases, such as the double-walled design of tank wagons, an improvement in the pressure relief valves and a change in the filling processes.

The events, as well as the film and photo recordings of the tragedy, became part of the fire brigade training nationwide and are used worldwide as a classic training example of this phenomenon, now known as BLEVE. According to the Emergency Response Guidebook , an evacuation zone of one mile (1.6 km) in all directions has since been observed for a burning tank wagon of this size .

There had been accidents with exploding tank wagons before. The two most famous occurred in 1970 in Crescent City ( Illinois ) with 66 injured and 1,971 in Houston ( Texas ) with one dead and 37 injured. In 1978 the Waverly explosion occurred in Tennessee , a BLEVE that left 16 dead and 43 injured.

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