Deepwater in 1907 -- Explosion

NW Mailing List nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org
Wed Apr 30 09:50:13 EDT 2008


This is derived from the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica
http://www.1911encyclopedia.org/Blasting#Explosives

snip
<<Like nitroglycerin, the common dynamites freeze at a temperature of
from 42° to 46° F. They are then comparatively safe, and so far as
possible should be transported in the frozen state. At very low
temperatures dynamite again becomes somewhat sensitive to shock. When
it is frozen at ordinary temperatures even the strongest detonating
caps fail to develop the full force. In thawing dynamite, care must
be exercised. The fact that a small quantity will often burn quietly
has led to the dangerously mistaken notion that mere heating will not
cause explosion. It is chiefly a question of temperature. If the
quantity ignited by flame be large enough to heat the entire mass to
the detonating point (say 360° F.) before all is consumed, an
explosion will result. Furthermore, dynamite, when even moderately
heated, becomes extremely sensitive to shocks.

There are several accepted modes of thawing dynamite: (I) In a water
bath, the cartridges being placed in a vessel surrounded on the sides
and bottom by warm water contained in a larger enclosing vessel. The
warm water may be renewed from time to time, or the water bath placed
over a candle or small lamp, not on a stove. (2) In two vessels,
similar to the above, with the space between them occupied by air,
provided the heat applied can be definitely limited, as by using a
candle. (3) When large quantities of dynamite are used a supply may
be kept on shelves in a wooden room or chamber, warmed by a stove, or
by a coil of pipe heated by exhaust steam from an engine. Live steam
should not be used, as the heat might become excessive. Thawing
should always take place slowly, never before an open fire or by
direct contact with a stove or steam pipes and care must be taken
that the heat does not rise high enough to cause sweating or
exudation of liquid nitroglycerin from the cartridges, which would be
a source of danger. >>
snip

Obviously, there is a reason to thaw dynamite, but most of these
folks probably could not read or have access to a reference book in
its day.

Ken Miller


On Apr 30, 2008, at 9:33 AM, NW Mailing List wrote:


> Surprisingly, I have run across several articles of similar

> accidents in the winter time. On Feb. 22 of this year I posted an

> article about a similar 1903 dynamite thawing explosion on the

> N&W's Big Sandy extention, and I just read of a similar 1907

> dynamite thawing explosion on a railroad constuction project in

> Kentucky. Also, yesterday I saw a 1907 article about a woman who

> was killed by a dynamite explosion in her kitchen. Her husband had

> placed some dynamite in the oven to thaw and forgot to tell his wife.

>

> When it comes to thawing dynamite in the good ol days, there are a

> lot of Darwin Award candidates.

>

> Gordon Hamilton

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