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Fertilizer Plant on Fire in Winston-Salem, NC

deac_tracy

By deac_tracy
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deac_tracy

deac_tracy 513

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Authorities were trying to extinguish it but due to a couple large ammonium nitrate tanks and a lack of water to adequately cool them, command has requested all units abandon equipment and pull back in a 1 mile radius. They're now asking everyone who lives within a mile radius to evacuate and plan to stay away for the next 48 hours. Reverse 911 calls are being made. Plant is less than 2 miles away from Wake Forest University and students living off campus close to the plant are asked to either find someone to live with on campus or bring a sleeping bag and go to the library. Apparently there's more ammonium nitrate in this plant then there was in the West, TX one, like way more.

 

Scary stuff.

 

 

 

https://myfox8.com/news/north-carolina/winston-salem/winston-salem-fire-crews-battle-blaze-at-fertilizer-business/

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South Austin

South Austin 51976

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3 minutes ago, Colonel Sanders said:

Wake is kind of an outlier from the others.  Maybe thinking NC State?

If you expand the area to include Winston-Salem, Wake Forest is only an hour and a half away, so that’s four schools of historically good basketball in a relatively close area. Not sure there’s another landscape in college basketball with a similar concentration of quality programs.

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Wiler77

Wiler77 1551

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1 hour ago, Doc Sam Beckett said:

Just an insanely beautiful campus and the coursework is difficult as shit. Your wife sounds like a badass, I'll take her

 

SIL is a WF grad with dual French and Art History degrees around 20 years ago.  That was an expensive education to get a job doing customer service at a credit card company.

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deadshank

deadshank 24648

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3 minutes ago, Wiler77 said:

SIL is a WF grad with dual French and Art History degrees around 20 years ago.  That was an expensive education to get a job doing customer service at a credit card company.

If it makes your feel any better, my WF grad wife is in the professional rodeo business.  Makes $25 / hour and costs me $250 / hour.  Joke is on me.

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Wiler77

Wiler77 1551

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2 minutes ago, deadshank said:

If it makes your feel any better, my WF grad wife is in the professional rodeo business.  Makes $25 / hour and costs me $250 / hour.  Joke is on me.

No skin off my back.  It's my SIL.  In her family, joke was on my FIL.  Private school for 13 years, then 4 years of WF.  That had to have cost >$350k.

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Kennythetiger

Kennythetiger 9325

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4 hours ago, deadshank said:

If it makes your feel any better, my WF grad wife is in the professional rodeo business.  Makes $25 / hour and costs me $250 / hour.  Joke is on me.

Perhaps, but your wife also sends you pictures of wildlife she sees on her travels. My wife and her math would call that a draw. 

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Trey3216

Trey3216 15321

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15 minutes ago, Uncle Nate said:

One mile isn't enough.  I would make it a 3 mile radius.

I agree.  I was inside a movie theater the night of the West explosion (in Waco) and the screen shook from the explosion.  I walked out of the theater not long after and in every direction all you could hear were police/fire/ambulance sirens going as fast as possible, and helicopters everywhere.  Was a weird damn deal.  

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TwiceHorn

TwiceHorn 31086

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12 minutes ago, Herbie Hancock said:

There was  an estimated 200 tons of NH4NO3 in West. I have a hard time believing there is 10x that amount at this place. Maybe 2-3x more but not 10. 1 mile is the standard ERG distance and probably more than adequate for the amount on hand.

Of all the AN disasters on the wiki page, only loaded ships had thousands of tons, so you're probably right.

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NorthLoop

NorthLoop 14053

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7 hours ago, Lou said:

From CNN:

There were 600 tons of ammonium nitrate and 5,000 tons of finished fertilizer on the site, Winston-Salem Fire Chief Trey Mayo said. That compares with the 240 tons of ammonium nitrate at a West, Texas, fertilizer plant blast that killed 15 people in 2013. Winston-Salem is more densely populated than rural West, Texas.

Math is hard

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Captainant

Captainant 27250

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7 hours ago, Lou said:

From CNN:

There were 600 tons of ammonium nitrate and 5,000 tons of finished fertilizer on the site, Winston-Salem Fire Chief Trey Mayo said. That compares with the 240 tons of ammonium nitrate at a West, Texas, fertilizer plant blast that killed 15 people in 2013. Winston-Salem is more densely populated than rural West, Texas.

I wonder what the difference is between ammonium nitrate and finished fertilizer... If it's just some extra additives to the nitrate, it'll still go boom just fine

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TwiceHorn

TwiceHorn 31086

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14 minutes ago, Captainant said:

I wonder what the difference is between ammonium nitrate and finished fertilizer... If it's just some extra additives to the nitrate, it'll still go boom just fine

Something I came across, maybe that wikipedia article, said AN is not real hazardous at concentrations of under 70% by weight.

I kind of assume that finished fertilizer probably means the N-P-K stuff (xx-yy-zz), or N-P or N-K, which probably have concentrations  less than 70%.

 

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Trey3216

Trey3216 15321

Posted
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7 hours ago, Captainant said:

I wonder what the difference is between ammonium nitrate and finished fertilizer... If it's just some extra additives to the nitrate, it'll still go boom just fine

Finished fertilizer would need an accelerant directly added to it to really do anything 

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