Moving on from exploding fire extinguishers, lets ponder upon exploding oxygen cylinders. Thinking about explosion it is very confusing to grasp. Because the phenomina of explosion and our basic understanding of explosion is very different. I have seen explosion in fire crackers. It had fuel, oxidizer, catalyst in the required ratio with sufficient confinement and with a source of ignition it produced an explosion.
But a fire extinguisher does not have fuel nor does it have oxygen inside it. But it exploded. Why ? For that you would have to go to my previous post.
Similarly an oxygen cylinder has oxygen and does not have fuel but it still explodes. Before going deep into the mechanics. Let us look at some case studies and understand the situations in which explosions have occoured and see if we can get a meaningful conclusion.
Case 01: Cement factory in Hirmi village
18th July , 1510 hrs | (Link to article)
The incident took place around 3.10 pm. Three men who had come to a cement factory for some pipeline repair work. The three deceased a welder and two helpers, had gone there with the oxygen cylinder to do the work. They were killed after the oxygen cylinder brought by them exploded due to an unknown reason.The impact was such that one of the workers was thrown 20 feet away from the spot.
Case 02: Two killed, six injured in oxygen cylinder blast in Lucknow
05th May 2021 | (Link to article)
Two persons have been killed and six others injured in a blast at an oxygen refilling station in Lucknow on Wednesday. According to initial inputs, the blast took place while the workers were refilling an oxygen cylinder.
Case 03: Oxygen cylinder explodes while refilling at Kanpur plant, 1 dies
Apr 30, 2021
Case 04: Uttar Pradesh: 2 people died in oxygen cylinder blast in Chandauli
Dec 30, 2022 | (Link to article)
Oxygen cylinder blast occurred in Chandauli district of Uttar Pradesh on December 30, in which two people died on the spot. While speaking on this incident, SP Chandauli Ankur Aggarwal said, “Two people died after an oxygen cylinder exploded when they were unloading it from a vehicle in Dayal Hospital in Ravi Nagar of Mughalsarai Kotwali. Police reached the spot, we are searching CCTV visuals.
The number of case studies goes on, there are mulitple conditions and multiple angles which leads to explosion of a cylinder. Each case is somwhat unique and covers a particular aspect or safety aspect which needs to be updated.
Now that i think about it, a case by case study with a compiled CAPA will the most apt option. So thats what we will do.