Massive Explosion At Texas Fertiliser Plant

[icyfroth]

A massive explosion has ripped through a fertiliser plant in West, Texas, possibly leaving 60-70 people dead including first responders. Many more people are injured, with reports the explosion 'levelled' buildings in a five-block radius, including a school and a nursing home.

Gulf war veteran Paul L. Manigrasso told KWTX he felt the blast in Waxahachie.

“Based on my Naval experience...we knew immediately what it was, but cannot believe it occurred 40 miles away,” he said.

"It was a small fire and then water got sprayed the ammonia nitrate, and it exploded just like the Oklahoma City bomb," Jason Shelton, a clerk at the Czech Best Western Hotel in West, told The Dallas Morning News.

"I live about a 300 metres from it and it blew my screen door off and my back windows. There's houses levelled that were right next to it.”

Bill Bohannan, who was visiting his parents in West, near the plant, witnessed the explosion.

"It knocked us into the car ... Every house within about four blocks is blown apart," he told the Waco Tribune-Herald.

Crystal Anthony told the paper that a nearby nursing home, apartment complex and West Middle School had also caught fire. Anthony said she and her daughter were almost knocked down several blocks from the explosion.

http://au.news.yahoo.com/world/a/-/world/16787850/massive-explosion-texas-fertiliser-plant/

I wonder if it's in anyway connected to the Boston bomb blast?

[debra9275]

My post  13 is wrong, it should be ' injured' . Fancy having a plant like that near  a nursing home, school & houses?

[izabsmiling]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ammonium_nitrate_disasters

Ammonium nitrate disasters

[polksaladallie]

My post  13 is wrong, it should be ' injured' . Fancy having a plant like that near  a nursing home, school & houses?

Yes, Debra, and that injury number will rise too, because people, including children, are apparently trapped in damaged buildings.

Wonder if the fertilizer plant was there first or vice versa?

[icyfroth]

Only 2 reported dead at of this minute.  But a lot injured.

😮

try reading.

"A massive explosion has ripped through a fertiliser plant in West, Texas, possibly leaving 60-70 people dead including first responders."

[izabsmiling]

is it 2 confirmed dead ?

anything else is guesswork

[izabsmiling]

'Like a nuclear bomb': Fertilizer plant blast levels homes, kills 2 in Texas townBy Lateef Mungin, CNN

 http://edition.cnn.com/2013/04/18/us/texas-explosion/index.html

[lionrose.7]

I remember years ago in NZ we had a explosion in a Button Factory from built up plastic, something to do with the ventilation.

[polksaladallie]

try reading.

"A massive explosion has ripped through a fertiliser plant in West, Texas, possibly leaving 60-70 people dead including first responders."

"POSSIBLY" - there's the problem.

I am watching it live, and hearing the words come out of the police chief's mouth.

As I said. there might well be a lot more deaths, but no numbers are being confirmed at this stage.

[mainecoon1]

I went through something like this when I was 9 and we lived in South Africa, right next to our housing estate was an industrial estate.

One night one of the factory caught fire and everyone from the estate was out on the street filming it or just watching it as it was huge.  All of a sudden boom the whole thing explode destroying nearly 100 home ours included.  We found out afterwards that the factory made matches and match boxes and had thousands of barrels of dynamite stored under ground.

We were informed that it was a good thing most people where in the street when it blew otherwise the death toll could have been huge, I think 9 people died and over a hundred people were injured.

It was a terrifying experience for us to go through, not only witnessing the explosion but loosing our home.  My poor Dad was at work at the time and could not get back on the estate so for nearly 24 hours he had no idea if we were dead or alive.

My heart goes out to all the people in and around this town

[icyfroth]

"POSSIBLY" - there's the problem.

I am watching it live, and hearing the words come out of the police chief's mouth.

As I said. there might well be a lot more deaths, but no numbers are being confirmed at this stage.

yes, you're right, my apologies.