1947 texas city, texas disaster

The 1947 Texas City Disaster is one of the largest non-nuclear explosions ever recorded. It is estimated that 500-600 people died in the explosion. The number of people wounded was estimated in the thousands. This report details a timeline and summary of the disaster events, describes why the disaster occurred, provides information about the investigation, and details the disaster aftermath. The timeline and summary of the events that occurred during the 1947 Texas City Disaster is described in the next section of this report.

        On April 16, 1947 in Texas City, Texas, just before 8:00am, longshoremen removed the hatch covers on Hold 4 of the French Liberty ship Grandcamp as they were preparing to load ammonium nitrate fertilizer to be shipped to Europe. It was supposed to be a part of the rebuilding process following World War II. They were loading the S.S. Grandcamp at the port of Texas City, however it was originally supposed to be loading the cargo at the Port of Houston. S.S. Grandcamp was carrying a cargo of 2,200 tons of ammonium nitrate. S. S .Grandcamp also had small arms ammunition, machinery, and bales of sisal twine on deck. About 600 feet away from S.S. Grandcamp, was another ship named S.S. High Flyer carrying about 960 tons of ammonium nitrate and about 1,800 tons of sulfur on board. The first explosion was at 9:12 AM in which the explosion destroyed the entire dock area, numerous oil tanks, The Monsanto Chemical Company, and many buildings. The second explosion occurred on S.S. High flyer at 1:10 AM on April 17. The explosions killed at least 568 people. Only 433 bodies were recovered on April 29, 1947. Around 2000 people sustained injuries in varying degrees.

        The first explosion on the S.S. Grandcamp occurred at 9:12 AM on April 16, 1947. The S.S. Grandcamp was a former Liberty Ship owned by the French Government, of 7176 tons about 437 feet long. Before being loaded with Ammonium Nitrate at the Texas City Port, it was loaded with considerable oil field machinery, drill stems, around 200 tons of peanut, and sisal twine of an unknown amount. Loading was at 8:00am when the ship was supposed to be loaded at 7:00am. The one longshoreman took about 10 minutes to remove the hatch from number 4 Hold prior to the loading operations. As he was opening the hatch to the 2300-ton cargo of ammonium nitrate, he notices an odor of smoke. He then immediately started investigating looking for the fire source. He was unable to find the exact spot of the fire; he started to remove bags to have a better view. Then calling for water, two buckets were applied with no effect and then a soda-acid extinguisher was used with still no effect. A hose line was becoming available; however, orders were given not to use it since it would damage the cargo. By the time 8:30 AM, the longshoremen were ordered to abandon the ship and to leave the area. The crew left the ship when prompted to, but by the end of the two explosions only seven of the men survived. In Number 5 Hold, there was ammunition, which the crew knew about and were in the process of quickly unloading that before the orders of the abandoning the ship were given. The fire department was called around the same time that the crew was getting off the ship. Four apparatuses responded to the scene. Around 8:45 AM, people near the scene stated that the smoke from the ship was a dense red-orange color. It is known that the fire could have been smoldering in Number 4 Hold for some time before being noticed. The ammonium nitrate was being store in combustible bags helping the rapid spread of the fire. At 9:12 AM, the S.S. Grandcamp exploded and about 5 seconds a second explosion occurred. Some people state that there was a third explosion from S.S. Grandcamp, however there is no evidence found that it did. There were reports of shocks and broken plate glass felt and found in Baytown, which is about 25 miles away. The explosions created a tidal wave about 15 feet high. The tidal wave carried an oil barge of size 150 feet in length, 28 feet wide, and 11 feet deep was lifted and carried about two hundred feet.

        The second explosion that occurred on the S.S. High Flyer, was a newer ship to Lykes Brothers Steamship Company. The ship was carrying 2000 tons of sulfur and 961 tons of ammonium nitrate in combustible bags. The explosion of the S.S. Grandcamp caused the S.S. High flyer to tear loose from its moorings and cross to the side of the S.S. Wilson B. Keene. The crew members at that time abandoned the ship. Crews from Galveston did come to try to untangle the two ships, but were unsuccessful. Again at 11:00 PM crews returned to try to untangle the two ships again and this time they were successful. The two ships were cleared of each other and the crews started moving the S.S. High Flyer away from the S.S. Wilson B. Keene, however just around 100 feet away, the S.S. High Flyer explosion occurred. It happened at 1:12 AM on April 18th, 1947. It is unclear where the fire started on the S.S. High Flyer. The next section of this report will describe why the disaster occurred.

        Responsibility of the 1947 Texas City Disaster is not blamed on a single person or single event. The official report the incident states “No attempt has been made in this report to place the responsibility on any person or any particular action for the explosion, rather an attempt has been made to follow the chain of events leading up to the explosion…” The official report also details that is was apparent that little was known about the danger of ammonium nitrate. Improper storage and improper classification was also listed as reason for misunderstanding of the cargo.

When it comes to the reason of the disaster, the problem must be defined from the beginning. For instance; the firefighters using water, the amount of ammonium nitrate that was on board and lack of experience lead to mishandling the situation. There were some misunderstandings which contributed to the increase of the situation. When the fire started, and the longshoremen found out about the fire, it was hard for them to extinguishing it because they had small amounts of water, and the flames only continued to grow up. When they realized their efforts weren’t enough, the fire alarm notified fire department about the situation. Unfortunately, when they arrived and tried to cool the fire, the ship's hatches were heating fast that it was unlikely that water could have extinguished the fire because of its magnitude (Texas City Library). 27 of the volunteer firefighters and the chief died in the explosion, and there was a delay in providing more help because of an ongoing telephone operator’s strike (Texas City Library). As soon as the authorities knew about it they sent more help, but the delay on it had an effect in how hard it was to put out the fire after.

The ship's captain tried to put out the fire on the ship avoiding damages to the cargo. He tried to force the steam that he saw into the cargo holds. Unfortunately, this action is believed to have caused the steam vapors to liquefy the ammonium nitrate. This ended up producing nitrous oxide, a substance with very high volatility (Texas City Library). According to the Texas City Library “It is also likely that the ammonium nitrate, which can itself produce the oxygen necessary to feed a fire, prevented the steam from dousing any flames. Steam also heated the internal compartments within holds 2 and 4, further escalating the core temperature of the vessel's cargo. The heat of the Grandcamp's cargo quickly approached 850 degrees Fahrenheit, the temperature at which ammonium nitrate will explode. Fuel oil, which lay in tanks between holds 3 and 4, may have ruptured the bulkhead and leaked onto the bags of ammonium nitrate, literally adding more fuel to the fire.” This situation contributed to the growth of the fire, leading to the explosions in the disaster.

After the first explosion took place, The High Flyer was parked very close to the Grandcamp but didn’t suffer big damages from that incident. However, the residues of the explosion did reach the second ship and cause it to eventually catch fire too. Even though this happened, the reason why this second fire became a huge second explosion in because there were about 1,000 tons of ammonium nitrate fertilizer and 2,000 tons of sulfur loaded into the holds of The High Flyer (Texas City Library). This combination was particularly dangerous because these two components become extremely volatile when mixed together. Because of the fire originated in the ship after the first explosion, these components ended up combusting and creating a second explosion, taking place in The High Flyer. By this time, evacuations had taken place in the area, but it was impossible to contain the fire before it exploded (Texas City Library)

The Grandcamp’s explosion triggered the worst industrial disaster, resulting in the largest number of casualties, in American history. Although not all casualties were residents of Texas City, the total was equivalent to 25 percent of the town's estimated population of 16,000. Aggregate property loss amounted to almost $100 million, or more than $700 million in today’s monetary value. This value is thought to be on the lower end of estimated losses, because it does not factor in the $1.5 million barrels of petroleum products that were consumed in flames.

This disaster could have been prevented from the very beginning during the incipient stage of the fire inside one of the cargo ships. The fire was thought to have been started from a discarded cigarette inside of the ship; however, the cigarette was never mentioned in the official report as the ignition source. Once the fire began, the ship’s captain demanded that the hatches be shut to the cargo and steam be pumped into the room in order to disrupt the thermal layer and smother the fire. This method of smothering fires by steam was commonly used by ship workers at the time. The steam only accelerated the heat of the ammonium nitrate inside of the cargo room even more rapidly. The hatch covers on the ship were blown off of their hinges just around 30 minutes after the ignition.

The mistake made here was adding the steam to the cargo rooms which, as mentioned previously, liquified the ammonium nitrate producing nitrous oxide. If the steam was never added to the cargo room, but the doors were still shut and sealed, this terrible disaster would have never taken place. The ammonium nitrate would have never been converted into nitrous oxide, and the depletion of oxygen from the doors being sealed would have eventually suffocated the fire rather than attempting to smother it.

To prevent future occurrences of these kinds of disasters, The Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) was put in place in 1970. This promoted safety to the leading concern of all employers, and required the compliance of employees with the safety regulation that their employer set in place. The Hazard Communication and Hazardous Waste Operations and Emergency Response (HAZWOPER) standards were just a few of very many standards that were developed under OSHA with regards to workplace safety (Havel).  

Today, heavy emphasis is placed on the hazards and hazardous materials that are present at the workplace. Emphasis is strongly placed on the training that employees need in order to safely work around hazardous chemicals. This is so that employees know how to handle a situation similar to this disaster if it is to happen again. If this disaster were to happen again, employees would know exactly who to contact, when to contact them, and what information to relay to them. This is a crucial process when dealing with hazardous material fires and can save a disaster such as this one from ever happening again.

Many companies have pre-incident plans so that the employees know exactly what to do in case of a fire. These pre-incident plans correlate directly with the location of the company and the chemicals used at the workplace. An Incident Command System is also put in place to establish the roles of each member on the emergency scene. This eliminates any confusion and wasted time trying to figure out who is in charge, and who else is supposed to do what. An emergency plan has also been developed and is exercised continuously at a large-scale for community-wide disasters so that everyone, even bystanders know what to do in similar circumstances.

The community-wide disaster plan is an excellent plan put in place as the employees and employers are not the only people that need to know what to do in case of an emergency. Tons and tons of bystanders were standing by watching the orange flames and smoke puff out of the ship. They did not realize that a massive explosion was about to take place as hazardous chemicals were involved. If these people would have had a community disaster plan, they would have known not to just stand around and watch such a horrific disaster take place, and take their lives. They would have began to evacuate the area, getting as many people to safety as possible before the massive explosion.

Today the Texas City port is still the eighth-largest deep-water port in the U.S. (Havel). It is protected by the Texas City Fire Department which consists of 62 career firefighters from three different stations. They provide excellent fire protection, EMS services, swift water rescue, high angle and confined-space rescue and even a highly trained hazardous materials team (Havel). They are surrounded by many mutual aid departments that can respond if need be. The protection that is offered at the port now is outstanding. They have made it beyond their priority to make sure that no disaster like this one ever happens again.