The Current Events Thread

[SaintCrazy]

There's been a huge explosion at a chemical/fertilizer plant in West, Texas. A fire was going on and when firefighters responded, some water reacted badly with some stuff in there.

news article/live feed

A video of the explosion, VERY LOUD, watch your volume, the explosion itself is around 0:30

[[Citation Needed]]

PEPCON 2: Chemical explosions strike again

[Kamak]

I'll be interested in the science behind this. I know fertilizer is a good explosive, but I've never gotten the science behind it.

There's a lot of plants up along IH35 up that way. I know there's a few sugar refineries up there too, and they have to be really careful about the sugar dust.

[Exeres]

I'll be interested in the science behind this. I know fertilizer is a good explosive, but I've never gotten the science behind it.

Fertilizer usually has ammonium nitrate in it. It's a rich fertilizer, and when it's pure and handled properly it is very stable and safe at temperatures below 400 degrees Fahrenheit. However, if impurities such as flouride or calcium are present and the fertilizer is exposed to heat (like the kind you get from being stuffed in metal containers left in the sun for a long time), it begins to chemically decompose. That decomposition creates more heat, leading to a chain reaction that eventually ends with the entire supply detonating.

Bomb makers like to take advantage of this to make homemade explosives. Ammonium nitrate was used in the Oklahoma City bombing, which will have happened 18 years ago exactly tomorrow.

[D-vid]

There's been a huge explosion at a chemical/fertilizer plant in West, Texas. A fire was going on and when firefighters responded, some water reacted badly with some stuff in there.

news article/live feed

A video of the explosion, VERY LOUD, watch your volume, the explosion itself is around 0:30

You'd think firefighters would be smart enough to know not to use water on a chemical fire.

[AngelicSongx]

That's near my city.. Pretty scary. I told my Dad all of yesterday that nothing crazy like what happened in Boston happens in Texas. (Well, this could be an accident, but still.)

[shazza]

^ actually if bad things like mass bombings WERE going to happen, texas is really high on the list of places because we have dallas, houston AND austin, and all right next to one another, and they're all really wealthy cities with headquarters of many huge businesses located there.

still feels like an accident to me. i mean...fertilizer. pretty scary though :[ that video of the bomb going off is like wow holy shit i'm so glad those people were alive

[TheStranger]

Isnt fertilizer pretty volatile? It sounds like an accident is most likely

[SaintCrazy]

Yeah. Probably somebody failed to communicate that to the firefighters.

[AngelicSongx]

Gunman shoots police officer at MIT
Nooo! I have a friend that goes there! He's alright though, thank God. So many horrible things happening in one week. ;-;

[Riku]

Once one person gets noticed for doing it, it provides the potential reality for everyone else who had made any serious considerations. Kind of like how suicides tend to trigger one another.

[Game Angel]

The shooting in MIT is related to the Boston Marathon bombers. Forgive me if I'm not entirely accurate, but I'll provide links at the end of my post. Two of the bombers were brothers, one of them was also killed overnight, and police are out for two suspects: the second bomber (Dzhokhar Tsarnaev) and an accomplice. I'm basically writing what I'm hearing on TV right now. Boston is on Lockdown, and Dzhokar is believed to be in Watertown, MA.

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/04 ... spect?lite

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/police-c ... ide-boston

[[Citation Needed]]

I was watching the news while sitting in Dunkin Donuts. Watertown is on complete lockdown. Some lady tweeted what she saw when she looked out her window at 7 AM today: two SWAT lying on the roof of her shed and aiming guns at her neighbors house.

[TheStranger]

daisies, things are really hitting the fan this month

[Mete]

More like, this week. Now all we need is a natural disaster.