It's hard to describe the smell. It wasn't an irritant like smoke from a bonfire or tear gas and it wasn't unpleasant as such. Not a "stink" like decaying flesh or spoiled food, but when you'd breathe it, it felt like it would drag you down. Like a heavy weight or like being underwater. Overwhelming. The air was filled with the white dust. I don't really think there was a fire (At least there were no flames), but the dust looked and acted like smoke. I think it was just powder from the stuff on the ground. Guys were walking all around and wading into the stuff, but now and then a guy would have a coughling spell. I really don't know how to explain it??? Then again,it may not even been the same wreck?? Tom
Tom - Do you recall ..... was this wreck an eastbound or a westbound train? If westbound, the Stauffer soda ash car was likely empty on the way back, as the ash comes from Wyoming. Looks like the smoke/fire was coming from boxcars. No telling what was in them. K
No idea what direction the train had been running. By the time I got there the wrecker was working and there weren't any engines in sight. The west side derrick was self-propelled, so there wasn't even a work train engine. I couldn't see the east side of the wreck and the other derrick. Tom
I have a photo from Frisco on my site after the derailment here: http://rrsignalpix.com/frisco_derailments.html
From the name of the carrier on the side of the derailed car it reads "Stauffer" which I believe is a chemical company. The white dust is quite possibly some kind of fertilizer, volatile if ignited, much like ammonia nitrate, but stable if not exposed to a source of ignition. Just my two cents worth. George
Almost certainly, the Stauffer bulk hopper car was carrying soda ash - aka sodium carbonate, Na2CO3. Soda ash is not toxic, it is not explosive, it is not flammable, it is not poison, it is not a threat to the environment, it is not bad. It is a natural material, mined and purified in Green River, Wyoming, which is where this car no doubt was loaded. Soda ash, however, is highly alkaline, which is why it is useful. It has a pH well over 10. Don't get it in your eyes. Without chemicals, life itself is not possible folks. Don't assume every chemical you see or hear about is something bad. Ken ps - The only major fertilizer that is explosive is ammonium nitrate. All the rest of them are inorganic chemicals that are largely innocuous (exception - ammonia, which you shouldn't try to breathe!), which is why fertilizers serve as plant nutrients, and indirectly, nutrients for our own bodies.
I found details to fill some of the blanks from the previous discussion. During the evening of August 13, 1972, Frisco Extra 62 East with 8-units in the locomotive consist, and 98 cars was passing through West Huben, a 8200 foot-long passing track, at MP 190.5, when the lead wheel set of the lead truck of SLSF 64018 (GB) suffered a hotbox, which caused the derailment of 43 cars. Three of the cars, which derailed carried hazardous materials. Tank car UCLX 5009 carried liquid chlorine, and the derailment caused one of the dome valves to leak. The clean-up crew was able to stop the leak. Cars FMLX 19013 and FMLX 19007 carried white phosphorous. The cars overturned and the commodity caught fire. One of my other sources indicates that one car carried white phosphorous and the other carried red phosphorous. FMLX 19013 was marked, "not for flammable commodities".
