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Clean Hydrogen Partnership

Fire on CGH2 trailer

Event

Event ID
487
Quality
Description

A compressed hydrogen trailer released accidentally hydrogen which ignited producing a hissing 60 jet flame.
It triggered the evacuation of a one-mile stretch. It was estimated that the tanker burned off about 32,000 cubic feet of hydrogen (ca. 75 kg) over a 2.5-hour period before the flame was extinguished.
The tanker contained about 100,000 cubic feet (ca. 230 kg) in 10 separate tubes. Firefighters climbed on the tanker truck during the incident to shut off the other nine tubes so their contents would not burn off as well.

Event Initiating system
Classification of the physical effects
Hydrogen Release and Ignition
Nature of the consequences
fire
Macro-region
North America
Country
United States
Date
Component involved
valve (generic)
Failure mode
rupture & ignition
Initiating cause
unknown
Root causes
Unknown
Date entry in HIAD
01/01/2017

Facility

Application
Hydrogen transport and distribution
Sub-application
CGH2 tube trailer
Hydrogen supply chain stage
All components affected

Tanker containing 100,000 cubic feet (ca. 230 kg) in 10 separate tube

Process temperature range [C]
ambient temperature (-50°C to +50°C)
Process pressure range [MPa]
medium to high pressure (10 to 50 MPa)
Location type
Unknown
Location
airport or airborne
Operational condition
Pre-event occurrences

Unknown

Emergency & Consequences

Number of fatalities
0
Number of injured persons
0
Post-event summary

1-mile radius evacuation
32,000 cubic feet (75 kg) hydrogen lost

Emergency action

Firefighters climbed on the tanker truck during the incident to shut off the other nine tubes so their contents would not burn off as well.

In-depth data

Release type
gas
Involved substances (% vol)
H2 100%
Released amount (kg)
75
Release temperature [°C]
25
Probable IGNITION SOURCE
Flame type

References

Sources categories
News
Reference & weblink