For the past few weeks I have really gotten into putting together my blog that will contain alot of the things I have learned in the last 50 years. I was able to chat with a few old timers who shared files or information on some incidents that may be lost to history. Some refuted facts that we believed were true. I would like to avoid that in my summaries as they can give the reader the wrong lessons learned. I got to chat with the chemist who actually tried to analyze the Gollub cylinder that exploded in 1988 killing 3 and severely injuring 1. While luck was with him he was so unsettled he left the gas industry.

Here is a sampling of some of the articles I am in the midst of writing. There are many more that I did not list

Unique Gas Issues or Incidents and Lessons Learned

1. Acetylene why is it dangerous to overpack or cap a leak? Why did FDNY pay for a company to fly people and equipment up from Texas to decommission 2 cylinders in Brooklyn?

2. Ammonia is a corrosive and a flammable gas. What PPE in an emergency? Responders have been serious injured by not considering the flammability hazard.

3. Arsine the Asia Freighter incident had over 10 people acutely exposed, what happened and what was the medical treatment and the lessons learned?

4. Arsine incidents which includes a 65 lb release

5. Boron trifluoride when released creates a dense white cloud, how to respond? It also does not respond to a mineral acid gas sensor for leak detection like the other acid gases

6. Chlorine, the DHS Jack Rabbit releases provide enormous ER information about a significant (20 ton) release. Would a firefighter and a fire engine survive a tsunami wave of chlorine?

7. Chlorine trifluoride almost destroyed a 300 mm Fab, what other incidents have happened? An overfilled cylinder ruptured and a operator made a mistake drilling into a cylinder.

8. Cryogenic liquid, what happens if you shoot an RPG into a liquid oxygen tank? Machine gun a liquid nitrogen tank? This happened in South America

9. Diborane is an unstable gas forming penta and decaborane over time. These are extremely reactive as well as dermal toxins. Pentaborane has been the cause of a worldwide EPA recall. One operator was splashed with it and was paralyzed for a week.

10. Disilane forms energetic byproduct in the vacuum pump and vent lines. One company surrounds their vacuum pumps with blast blankets.

11. Explosive Gas Mixtures, Almost 40 known incidents 1963- 2019 many fatal. Why did they happen? They containue

12. Fluorine even at 0 psig can react with stainless tubing. To control this problem the pressure is limited to 500 psig in the cylinder

13. Gas mixtures made with a liquefied gas can reliquefy during cold temperatures. Will they remix?

14. Germane is an unstable gas that ruptured a cylinder in 1984. The controls put in place have prevented at least 3 major incidents

15. Hydrogen chloride, why did the 40’ tube trailer explode?

16. Hydrogen selenide has been involved in at least 3 incidents where the entire cylinder was released causing multiple acute exposures, what happened?

17. Purification of nitrogen trifluoride using a active solid such as mole sieve can be dangerous. Explosions and fire

18. Nitrous oxide, laughing gas everyone assumes is benign, yet it has been involved in a number of severe explosions.

19. Nitric oxide becomes shock sensitive at cold temperatures. Explosions during purification

20. Phosphine

21. Severity of a silane explosion, how much does it take to completely flatten a gas cabinet?

22. The Gollub incident in 1988 has been the silane incident with the most severe outcome (3 fatalities and 1 Injury). The chemist that attempted to analyze the cylinder speaks about what happened

23. Unusual silane incidents, remove the valve while the cylinder is full! operate a silane supply business from a motel! Corrosion of a cylinder in a heated water bath, silane permeated through the cylinder walls. Overpacking this silane cylinder while the wall is popping and flashing.

24. Thermodynamically unstable gases such as acetylene, cyanogen, diborane,, germane, nitrous oxide, incidents and how did we control them in the cylinder?

There is a lot of interest in this, if you have anything to share please contact me

Eugene Ngai

Chemically Speaking LLC

www.chemicallyspeakingllc.com