No, the cold AP going bang I am not concerned about. As you say though,
hot is perhaps another matter...
There are some trees right next to (and overhanging) the building, and it
gets _very_ dry here this time of year. On the other hand, the storage
building is concrete, the drums are steel (albeit probably polymer lined
and the AP is in poly bags), and the floor seems to be concrete rather than
asphalt.
I just feel that if there is a possiblity it could (however unlikely) go
bang, then it really ought to be stored in the explosives magazines, i.e.
well away from offices. Our RDX raw material, for example, is quite
unlikely to go bang in a fire; it is stored in cardboard boxes, so light
confinement. It'll burn vigorously sure, and I certainly wouldn't get too
close to it, but it is quite unlikely to go bang. But there's no way we'd
store a 1000kg next to offices. That is my reasoning anyway...
On 23 July 2015 at 15:40, Peter Fairbrother <zenadsl6186@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On 23/07/15 11:39, James Padfield wrote:
[...] I am still in two
minds as to whether I should be worried about the 1000kg of AP being
stored 25m from my office. I'd certainly feel happier if it was stored
in a mounded magazine on the other side of site!
My 2c.
A ton of 200 micron cold AP isn't going to detonate unless it is
substantially and intimately contaminated with some fuel, or unless someone
sets it off with a good-sized chunk of high explosive.
Assuming neither of those two cases, I wouldn't worry about it.
A ton of 200 micron hot AP is perhaps another matter - but you have at
least a couple of minutes to RUN LIKE FUCK once it starts burning (which
you will know about, especially if the wind blows towards your office!).
If you aren't disabled, and your office isn't in a tall building, you
should be OK even if it starts burning. Don't forget to RUN!!
I don't know of enough data to say how probable a DDT in a ton of burning
AP is, but the little data I know of suggests that it is highly unlikely to
detonate at all. It takes quite a bit more than a single ton for DDT to be
likely.
Even in the unlikely event that it does go off, it won't all explode -
maybe 100kg TNT equivalent, maximum, and almost certainly considerably less.
At absolute worst, at 25m the maximum overpressure would be around 10psi,
4ms duration - no fun at all, possibly life-changing, but the barotrauma
would be most unlikely to be fatal unless you are old and frail.
The building would be severely damaged, though the short duration and low
dynamic pressure would make collapse of all but the flimsiest buildings
unlikely. Shrapnel (think door and window frames, glass) would be the
biggest danger to life.
-- Peter Fairbrother
