2019 Philadelphia Refinery Explosion
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2019 Philadelphia Refinery Explosion
In the early morning of June 21, 2019, a fire and multiple explosions occurred at the Philadelphia Energy Solutions (PES) refinery in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. A release of hydrocarbons and hydrofluoric acid in the refinery's alkylation unit caused a ground-hugging vapor cloud which rapidly ignited, leading to three separate explosions minutes apart from each other. The largest explosion, a BLEVE, sent a vessel fragment flying across the Schuylkill River. Five employees sustained minor injuries, but there were ultimately no fatalities. The refinery announced it would shut down operations the same month, and filed for bankruptcy a month later. Background The Philadelphia Energy Solutions refinery was an oil refinery complex in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was first used in 1866 by the Atlantic Petroleum Storage Company, who built the complex to store and transport petroleum and its byproducts. By 1870, the company had become Philadelphia's largest employer and a leader in ...
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Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 1,603,797 in the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. The city is the urban core of the Philadelphia metropolitan area (sometimes called the Delaware Valley), the nation's Metropolitan statistical area, seventh-largest metropolitan area and ninth-largest combined statistical area with 6.245 million residents and 7.379 million residents, respectively. Philadelphia was founded in 1682 by William Penn, an English Americans, English Quakers, Quaker and advocate of Freedom of religion, religious freedom, and served as the capital of the Colonial history of the United States, colonial era Province of Pennsylvania. It then played a historic and vital role during the American Revolution and American Revolutionary ...
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Gasoline
Gasoline ( North American English) or petrol ( Commonwealth English) is a petrochemical product characterized as a transparent, yellowish, and flammable liquid normally used as a fuel for spark-ignited internal combustion engines. When formulated as a fuel for engines, gasoline is chemically composed of organic compounds derived from the fractional distillation of petroleum and later chemically enhanced with gasoline additives. It is a high-volume profitable product produced in crude oil refineries. The ability of a particular gasoline blend to resist premature ignition (which causes knocking and reduces efficiency in reciprocating engines) is measured by its octane rating. Tetraethyl lead was once widely used to increase the octane rating but is not used in modern automotive gasoline due to the health hazard. Aviation, off-road motor vehicles, and racing car engines still use leaded gasolines. Other substances are frequently added to gasoline to improve chemical st ...
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WHYY-TV
WHYY-TV (channel 12) is a television station licensed to Wilmington, Delaware, United States, serving as the primary PBS member station for the Philadelphia area. It is owned by WHYY, Inc., alongside NPR member WHYY-FM (90.9). WHYY-TV and WHYY-FM share studios and offices on Independence Mall in Center City, Philadelphia, with an additional office in Wilmington; through a channel sharing agreement with WMCN-TV (channel 44), the two stations transmit using WHYY-TV's spectrum from an antenna in Philadelphia's Roxborough section. WHYY-TV is one of four PBS member stations serving the Philadelphia market, alongside Philadelphia-licensed WPPT (channel 35), Allentown-based WLVT-TV (channel 39), and NJ PBS (WNJS, channel 23, and WNJT, channel 52). In southern Delaware and on the Delmarva Peninsula, WHYY-TV is seen on WDPB (channel 64), a full-time rebroadcaster in Seaford, Delaware. WHYY-TV was established in 1957 on channel 35 in Philadelphia as the first educational TV s ...
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Elbow Pipe
A fitting or adapter is used in pipe systems to connect sections of pipe (designated by nominal size, with greater tolerances of variance) or tube (designated by actual size, with lower tolerance for variance), adapt to different sizes or shapes, and for other purposes such as regulating (or measuring) fluid flow. These fittings are used in plumbing to manipulate the conveyance of fluids such as water for potatory, irrigational, sanitary, and refrigerative purposes, gas, petroleum, liquid waste, or any other liquid or gaseous substances required in domestic or commercial environments, within a system of pipes or tubes, connected by various methods, as dictated by the material of which these are made, the material being conveyed, and the particular environmental context in which they will be used, such as soldering, mortaring, caulking, plastic welding, welding, friction fittings, threaded fittings, and compression fittings. Fittings allow multiple pipes to be conne ...
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Elbow Pipe From Pes Explosion
The elbow is the region between the arm, upper arm and the forearm that surrounds the elbow joint. The elbow includes prominent landmarks such as the olecranon, the cubital fossa (also called the chelidon, or the elbow pit), and the Lateral epicondyle of the humerus, lateral and the Medial epicondyle of the humerus, medial epicondyles of the humerus. The elbow joint is a hinge joint between the arm and the forearm; more specifically between the humerus in the upper arm and the radius (bone), radius and ulna in the forearm which allows the forearm and hand to be moved towards and away from the body. The term ''elbow'' is specifically used for primate, humans and other primates, and in other vertebrates it is not used. In those cases, forelimb plus joint is used. The name for the elbow in Latin is ''cubitus'', and so the word cubital is used in some elbow-related terms, as in ''cubital nodes'' for example. Structure Joint The elbow joint has three different portions surrounded ...
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Shelter In Place
Shelter-in-place (SIP; also known as a shelter-in-place warning, Specific Area Message Encoding, SAME code SPW) is the act of seeking safety within the building one already occupies, rather than emergency evacuation, evacuating the area or seeking a community emergency shelter. The American Red Cross says the warning is issued when "chemical, biological, or radiological contaminants may be released accidentally or intentionally into the environment" and residents should "select a small, interior room, with no or few windows, taking refuge there." Radiological and chemical contamination Shelter in place in radiological and chemical defense scenarios entails closing all household doors, windows, and vents and taking immediate Shelter (building), shelter in a readily accessible location that puts as much indoor air and radiation shielding-mass between the individual and the hazardous outside air, such as a basement or centrally located medium to small room, and trying to make it as a ...
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Bunker Gear
Firefighters in Chicago wearing rubber three-quarter boots and jacket Firefighters in Montreal in full turnout gear during a fire Bunker gear (also known as turnout gear, fire kit and incident gear) is the personal protective equipment (PPE) used by firefighters. The term is derived from the fact that the trousers and boots are traditionally kept by the firefighters bunk at the fire station to be readily available for use. History left, Toolbelt with gloves and tools The modern firefighter's helmet was developed in 1830 by luggage maker Henry Gratacap, a volunteer firefighter in New York City. This helmet is recognizable today as the "New York" style of helmet, and has retained the same basic shape. The helmet had a brimmed front to affix a leather shield, usually adorned with a company A company, abbreviated as co., is a Legal personality, legal entity representing an association of legal people, whether Natural person, natural, Juridical person, juridica ...
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Boiling Liquid Expanding Vapor Explosion
A boiling liquid expanding vapor explosion (BLEVE, ) is an explosion caused by the rupture of a Pressure vessel, vessel containing a Compressed fluid, pressurized liquid that has attained a temperature sufficiently higher than its boiling point at atmospheric pressure. Because the boiling point of a liquid rises with pressure, the contents of the pressurized vessel can remain a liquid as long as the vessel is intact. If the vessel's integrity is compromised, the loss of pressure drops the boiling point, which can cause a portion of the liquid to Boiling, boil and form a cloud of rapidly expanding vapor. BLEVEs are manifestations of explosive boiling. If the vapor is Combustibility and flammability, flammable (as is the case with compounds such as hydrocarbons and alcohol (chemistry), alcohols) and comes in contact with an ignition source, further damage can be caused by the ensuing explosion and fireball. However, BLEVEs do not necessarily involve fire. Name On 24 April 1957 ...
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Butane
Butane () is an alkane with the formula C4H10. Butane exists as two isomers, ''n''-butane with connectivity and iso-butane with the formula . Both isomers are highly flammable, colorless, easily liquefied gases that quickly vaporize at room temperature and pressure. Butanes are a trace components of natural gases (NG gases). The other hydrocarbons in NG include propane, ethane, and especially methane, which are more abundant. Liquefied petroleum gas is a mixture of propane and some butanes. The name butane comes from the root but- (from butyric acid, named after the Greek word for butter) and the suffix -ane (for organic compounds). History The first synthesis of butane was accidentally achieved by British chemist Edward Frankland in 1849 from ethyl iodide and zinc, but he had not realized that the ethyl radical dimerized and misidentified the substance. It was discovered in crude petroleum in 1864 by Edmund Ronalds, who was the first to describe its proper ...
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Isobutane
Isobutane, also known as ''i''-butane, 2-methylpropane or methylpropane, is a chemical compound with molecular formula HC(CH3)3. It is an isomer of butane. Isobutane is a colorless, odorless gas. It is the simplest alkane with a tertiary carbon atom. Isobutane is used as a precursor molecule in the petrochemical industry, for example in the synthesis of isooctane. Production Isobutane is obtained by isomerization of butane. Uses Isobutane is the principal feedstock in alkylation units of refineries. Using isobutane, gasoline-grade "blendstocks" are generated with high branching for good combustion characteristics. Typical products created with isobutane are 2,4-dimethylpentane and especially 2,2,4-trimethylpentane. Solvent In the Chevron Phillips slurry process for making high-density polyethylene, isobutane is used as a diluent. As the slurried polyethylene is removed, isobutane is "flashed" off, and condensed, and recycled back into the loop reactor for this purpose. Prec ...
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Butene
Butene, also known as butylene, is an alkene with the formula . The word ''butene'' may refer to any of the individual compounds. They are colourless gases that are present in crude oil as a minor constituent in quantities that are too small for viable extraction. Butene is therefore obtained by catalytic cracking of long-chain hydrocarbons left during refining of crude oil. Cracking produces a mixture of products, and the butene is extracted from this by fractional distillation. Butene can be used as the monomer for polybutene, but this polymer is more expensive than alternatives with shorter carbon chains such as polypropylene. Polybutene is therefore used in more specialized applications. Butenes are more commonly used to make copolymer (mixed with another monomer such as ethylene). Butenes are major constituents of raffinates, the C4 fractions in oil processing. The raffinates containing butadiene are considered carcinogenic and mutagenic. They can be used as feedstocks ...
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Hydrocarbon
In organic chemistry, a hydrocarbon is an organic compound consisting entirely of hydrogen and carbon. Hydrocarbons are examples of group 14 hydrides. Hydrocarbons are generally colourless and Hydrophobe, hydrophobic; their odor is usually faint, and may be similar to that of gasoline or Naphtha, lighter fluid. They occur in a diverse range of molecular structures and phases: they can be gases (such as methane and propane), liquids (such as hexane and benzene), low melting solids (such as paraffin wax and naphthalene) or polymers (such as polyethylene and polystyrene). In the fossil fuel industries, ''hydrocarbon'' refers to naturally occurring petroleum, natural gas and coal, or their hydrocarbon derivatives and purified forms. Combustion of hydrocarbons is the main source of the world's energy. Petroleum is the dominant raw-material source for organic commodity chemicals such as solvents and polymers. Most anthropogenic (human-generated) emissions of greenhouse gases are eithe ...
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