Today I exchanged e-mails with a longtime member of SAFTENG and the Fire Chief of the Waxahachie Fire Dept regarding the Magana Blend flammable liquids fire on October 3, 2011. The Chief is being very open and helpful in sharing as much information that he can at this time. He has given me permission to post his e-mail exchange with the SAFTENG.net Member so that others may learn from this incident. Many THANKS John!!!!
From: David Hudgins
Sent: Thursday, November 03, 2011 5:06 PM
To: John XXXXXXXXX
Subject: RE: Magnablend
The fire started in the West end of the building, the product being made was used in waste water treatment plants and was water base. The company had always made the produce in no more than 500 gal. batch, however that day they decided to do a batch of 2,500 gal., the problem with the product was it produced Hydrogen gas in it’s steam cloud. Making a batch 5 times the normal over ran the fan system and the gas was ignited. The fire then got into other products and poly tanks started to burn. On the East end of the building there were hundreds of 330 gal. totes, the heat started breaking down the totes plastic and mineral oil started pouring out ( not on fire) on the floor. We lost the fire sprinkler systems just a few minutes into the fire ( we believe from the Hydrogen gas fire). Now we have mineral oil on top of water coming out of the building, this is when the fire safety officer saw what was happened and ordered everyone out of the area, the fire truck that was lost was trying to get down and get out of the way, all of that took about 2Min. and then hell broke loose when the oil caught on fire. I hope I have answered your question—if not please call me and I will visit with you—972-938-0543.
David Hudgins, Fire Chief
Just two more questions:
1. Do you think if metal containers had been used for the mineral oil would have made a significant difference in the overall size of the fire?, and
2. Do you mind if I share your comments within my own company?
From: David Hudgins
Sent: Friday, November 04, 2011 8:14 AM
To: John XXXXXXXXXX
Subject: RE: Magnablend
Yes, the breaking down of the plastic and the mineral oil was the reason we could not stop the fire –inside and outside of the building. The one end of the building where the fire started would have been lost ,but the other end was due to the break down of the plastic in the totes. I do not care if you share this with anyone, it is what happened and why we lost all of the building and one fire truck, but we had to try and stop it because we had the rail cars next.