"Forest Fire" responsible for a 2.5mi *mushroom cloud*?

[Bill Stewart]

 > That of course brings us full circle: how many fuels can produce a blast
 > which results in a 2+ mile mushroom?  That's a *lot* of explosive force.

Blast sets off the forest fire, fire makes the smoke.  Not a problem.
Go visit Northern California in late summer firestorm season
(though we don't need fertilizer plants to start fires;
smaller accidents or stupid people can do the job just fine.)

At 03:07 PM 9/12/2004, J.A. Terranson wrote:
> > http://www.muenster.org/uiw/fach/chemie/material/gif/oppau.jpg
>Wow!  I had no idea ammonium nitrate (ANFO for all intents and purposes,
>yes?) could produce that kind of result!  How much was there?

No FO, just AN all by itself.  NH4NO3 turns into N2 + 2H2O + O,
and the leftover O finds something productive to do,
like combine with another O into O2, or burn some nearby carbon,
and it's hot enough the H2O is gaseous also.
If you've got FO, it'll happily combine with the spare O,
producing lots of heat and speeding up the reaction.

The first earthquake-like event I experienced was when a
chemical plant across the river from where I lived blew up;
I think it was a fertilizer plant of some sort.
(I was in Delaware; the plant was in New Jersey, and it was ~1968.)
Fertilizer plants blow up real good; about the only thing better
are ammunition depots and maybe explosives plants,
and usually those are built to contain the explosion better.

(By the way, most people think of the Parthenon as an ancient ruin;
it was actually in very good shape, roof and all, until ~1850,
when the Greeks were using it as an ammunition depot during
one of their wars with the Turks and the Turks blew it up.)


----
Bill Stewart  bill.stewart at pobox.com