Liquid storage tanks don't normally have relief vents sized for combustion in the tank. Quite often, they will have emergency vents, but those are sized to relieve vapors generated by fire exposure, not for combustion in the tank itself. I couldn't get the video to play, but didn't see anything to indicate the tank was repurposed, either.

Quote (Caption https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/07/24/18/8772109...)

The boiler tank was being welded by workers who were contracted through a third-party when it exploded. The impact of the blast ejected the tank to an empty lot next to the José Cuervo factory

This sounds like a fuel / air explosion in a tank ignited by welding. An easy mistake if you do not have the correct safety gear on site to ensure the tank atmosphere is not explosive / ignitable.

As the tank is called a "boiler tank", and that the tank is located in a distillery, I can guess that the tank might have a heating coil, and might be used to distill something, but the normal use of the tank is unlikely to have initiated this event.

MJ, notice the country this occurred in and notice where so many of their working aged men are going. Neutering OSHA may not be as much of a problem as the mass importation of workers that don't even know what OSHA is.

Not limited to OSHA regulations. Boeing and everyone else has a potentiol get out of jail card. Free, except for the cost of the judge. Welcome to the 3rd world.

--Einstein gave the same test to students every year. When asked why he would do something like that, "Because the answers had changed."

But think of the profits.

The issue is not Neutering OSHA, as much as OSHA, and other ABC government entities, creating laws that congress expressly did not give them power to do. Tug, I agree some of what OSHA does is good, but we need to call it out when they get out of bounds.

But none of this applies outside the US.

These agencies not only make laws, but they adjudicate them and enforce them. No separation of powers, no checks and balances here.

The problem with sloppy work is that the supply FAR EXCEEDS the demand

Air Resource Board enters the chat.

Congress makes law.
Regulations are agency interpretations of the law that should keep you within the intent of the law.
Any regulatory requirement could be challenged in court and still can be.

What Changed
Courts may not defer to an agency’s interpretation of the law just because it (the law) might be ambiguous. Instead, from now on, the Supreme Court said that judges “must exercise their independent judgment” when ruling on cases involving agency rules, regulations, guidance, or other actions. This signifies a major shift, putting much more oversight and accountability in the hands of judges. Now, judges will be freer to impose their own readings of the law — giving them broad leeway to upend regulations on health care, the environment, financial regulations, technology and more.

Unelected judges will independently decide questions on how the law will be interpreted. So in other words, judges will now make the regulations. Judges can strike down rules based on their own policy preferences. Until now, a court had to let the agencies’ interpretations stand as long as they fell within the realm of reasonability, even if the judge didn’t think it was the best reading. Now the judges can do what they like. IMO, that's exactly like you asking me, if you should have brain surgery. I know best. No matter if I know nothing. My no-nothing ruling is just simply far better than your 100-doctor medical opinion.

The courts now have exclusive power over every open issue—no matter how expertise-driven or policy-laden—involving the meaning of regulatory law. The courts are now the country’s administrative czar. Please explain how that makes things better. You have only removed the experts from the decision process. See how well you do when I remove your brain entirely.

If you think it's bad now, wait and see what engineering marvels will result from judges independent decisions on design and operating issues, how long it will take to get any decision at all, what you will do in the meantime and if the judges design is worse or better than yours, if it works, or just simply blows up in your face. So, let's see what the courts have up their sleeves for the FAA certification process, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, FDIC, SEC, FDA.... and if all judges are of the same opinion. Of course not. Leading to chaos in the lower courts until SCOTUS imposes their solution. Again Unelected political appointees, again with no first hand experience in anything likely to be of relevance to any of these types of cases, being briefed by lawyers of similar qualifications.

The only thing I can think of that could be worse is Congress trying to write laws so specific that nothing is left to interpretation by either agencies or courts. Just increase the CFRs by a 1E9 factor, not written by any persons knowledgeabl in the fields, with the possible exception of lobbyist's biased contributions.

Boeing better get used to their planes only being allowed to fly within the US borders.


--Einstein gave the same test to students every year. When asked why he would do something like that, "Because the answers had changed."

Quote (MJCronin)

(Expect a lot more of this in the continental USA if the Repubs win in November ... and destroy OSHA & CSB)

Quote (1503-44)

Not limited to OSHA regulations. Boeing and everyone else has a potentiol get out of jail card.

There's too much hand-wringing on political issues here. Is this an engineering forum or not? Besides, you are completely misplaced on what government agency regulates and audits pressure vessels and boilers. In the US, it is the States that perform this function, not the Federal government.

Let's not side-track from the actual engineering issue:

The boiler tank was being welded by workers who were contracted through a third-party when it exploded. The impact of the blast ejected the tank to an empty lot next to the José Cuervo factory

Agreed with FacEngrPe - an internal deflagration is not something that would be required to be considered by boiler code or any other applicable RAGAGEP, and there are very few vessels designed with internal deflagration in mind. This would be a failure of the hot work or LOTO system, by my guess.

Are these the same experts that believe disturbed soil should be reseated to three blades of grass per square inch? The same experts that told wheat farmers they need several porta-potties per unit of land for the harvesters. Or I could go on, but the point is some of the experts are not very big picture people.
I have an OSHA cowboy inspection cartoon in my office that shows how over reaching they can be.
But life involves risks, and you can't fix all of them.

The sad point is the people who can't see the risks of what they are doing, or any concept of what the risks are.

So you all say regulations are not part of engineering?

Pipeline regulation is not by states, railroad and interstate trucking transportation, Highway and Airport design are all by DOT/FAA/PHMSA/FHA. Marine Navigation. Coast Guard. Interstate commerce. Food and drugs, medical treatments by FDA. Security and Exchange, Banking, FCC, There are many things that the States have no reguations for at all, not to mention no capacity to regulate at all. Plus 52 sets of regulations won't fly well and increase their cost by way more than 52 times (I include DC and Puerto Rico.) Look at the volumes of CFRs. Now all subject to some judge's, or many judges, personal bias and interpretation. Most of you are downwind, or downstream of some other state and you all just got time transported to 1886.

Yes Cranky, the sad part of it is exactly why the regulations exist. Sure, some may seem silly, but you can contest those in court anyway. Except now you may be at a loss to explain if your treatment is working, or if its just the cocaine kicking in.


--Einstein gave the same test to students every year. When asked why he would do something like that, "Because the answers had changed."

1503-44

NO! You have it backwards. Regulations should NEVER be "part" of engineering. Engineering SHOULD be part of regulations. Adoption of engineering standards, like ASME BPVC, is a perfect example as engineering that becomes regulation. I am NOT saying that federal regulations are superfluous or can be abolished at will. I happen to think that federal regulations are quite important to our society.

I'm also saying that the case that was being discussed, which involves a boiler, IS the under the purview of states, most of which adopt ASME code as law.

All this political talk about OSHA and other agencies being abolished runs rather far afield from the original content. Your comment about pipeline regs, DOT regs, etc. is also off the mark. In this particular case, the governing regulation would be set by the state, not a federal agency.

If you want to discuss upcoming election impacts on regulations affecting engineering "Where is Engineering Going in the Next 5 Years" is a much better place to post. The main discussion here should be centered on internal deflagration, engineering considerations, etc. Not an upcoming election.

Societies such as ASME, American Bureau of Shipping, UL, etc... are all privately operated and have competition. If they put out bad regulations, we can use different organizations. A recent personal example involved ABS. They were asking us to jump through unreasonable hoops with regards to acquisition of a component so we went to US Coast Guard for approval instead. They accepted ASME's rules for the same component.

Meanwhile, Air Resource Board tells me that I can no longer run my brand new engines that they approved 5 years earlier and require millions of dollars per vessel to replace.

OSHA is not effective in Tequila, Mexico https://maps.app.goo.gl/UF4cVJ2NwZnDQXNL9
Mexico has a workplace safety regulator, Link. My Spanish is not good enough to decipher Mexico's boiler regulations, other than that they exist.

The only safety relief that is remotely applicable to this situation is a frangible tank roof. https://youtu.be/PBiH5Ofd-dw. This tank did not have a frangible roof, as that would have left the tank shell on the ground, and only the tank roof would have gone flying.

TiC4 is correct. Some of you are taking this issue way out its scope. All the OSHA, ASME, ASTM, US state and federal regulations do not apply. FacEngr points it out - this happened in Mexico.

But sadly, in many countries the regulations that do exist are often skirted with bribes to inspectors. I don't know about in this case, but with people hurt, I would tend to suspect so.
The issue maybe that professional society's tend to be international, but the documents may not be translated and usable outside English speaking countries. This maybe a gap that does not allow other countries to adopt these standards.

Just to note- there have been tanks in the US that were blown up by people welding on them when they shouldn't have been- I remember seeing one or more CSB reports along these lines.
To the frangible roof- yes, that would have helped, although they aren't necessarily intended for that effect. Frangible roofs can be hard to achieve on small tanks like that, though.
I have seen a few silos that were to be designed with explosion panels adequate to vent a dust explosion, but have never seen that on a liquid tank.

Based on the articles I have read so far, there is not enough information to armchair quarterback this event. I think the term "boiler" may be a mistranslation, especially considering these articles are being written by people with non-technical backgrounds. The terms tank-boiler-vessel in different combinations and meanings are not very conclusive in translation, unless one knows the actually technical vernacular. (hoping a technical native Spanish speaker may chime in)
The only facts that seem to be evident is there was an explosion as a result of what is described as welding, on some sort of vessel/boiler/tank. As JStephen noted, this happens in the US as well. The explosion, in turn, caused a fire, which spread to other vessels.
A few comments: Alcohol fires are notoriously difficult to fight, due to alcohol's polar natural and its almost invisible daytime flame. Also, assuming Jose Cuervo is no different, typical distillation of spirits results in an extremely high proof (180-190 range) but is cut with water before bottling, so any bulk storage of the tequila likely had an extremely high ethanol content.

https://www.scotchwhiskyexperience.co.uk/about/abo...

This how we do Scottish whisky

I believe the cheaper fake whiskys will pasteurize and cool in the same tank as the fermentation.

Almost certainly they drained the tank to make the repair, filling it with typical 20% Oxygen atmosphere and a suitable amount of remaining alcohol and didn't bother to rinse it out with water and ventilate the remaining explosive mixture.

Instead they built a fuel-air bomb and set it off.

OSHA isn't required - high school chemistry class is.

And breathing in that mixture isn't going to help you with making good decisions....

Remember - More details = better answers
Also: If you get a response it's polite to respond to it.

Quote:

Almost certainly they drained the tank to make the repair, filling it with typical 20% Oxygen atmosphere and a suitable amount of remaining alcohol and didn't bother to rinse it out with water and ventilate the remaining explosive mixture.

Could be. Or they could have rinsed in out with cold water and couple inches of water were left on the bottom of the tank. An LEL reading was taken, all good! What wasn't considered was the % of alcohol still in the water on the floor. The welding combined with some nice Mexican sun, heated up the vessel and water/alcohol mix remaining on the floor of the vessel until the LEL was reached and boom. There could have been safety protocols in place and followed, unintended and unforeseen events do occur. I'm not saying this is even possible (chemE's feel free to pile on), but any event like this can serve as a reinforcement of known safety practices but sometimes they can also serve as a learning tool to prevent future catastrophes.

Heaviside1925,

A residual alcohol/water mix still should have shown up on an LEL meter. I've seen a reference that beers above 3.5 ABV% have a flash point of 100F-200F, meaning to be flammable on a hot day there would need to be at least 3% ABV in the tank. I guess the wide range depends on whatever properties exist in the beer. The LEL of ethanol is 3.3%, so a 1% reading on the LEL would be .033%, or approximately 330 ppmv (maybe up to 1000 ppmv, depending on what the LEL meter calibration factor is). Either way, the vapor pressure of 3% ethanol in water is high enough that something should have shown up if it were in the tank already.

I don't know their hot work procedure, but any tank that typically contains flammable materials upon which we would be welding would be continuously monitored during the hot work, not just at the outset of the work.

TiCl4 Thank you. I guess my point was, there could have been measures taken to ensure the tank did not contain flammable material but did not consider other factors. Sadly, most times, it's just complacency or ignorant people doing ignorant things and this very well maybe the case, but I am always curious whether there were unknown factors at play and that can serve as a learning moment.

Hot works on tanks in Aberdeen caused quite a few changes of pants in the 80's.

Then they went extreme with the work card processes for pretty much everything post piper alpha.

It's now at the point you get a written warning for not using the handrail going up stairs.

Safety regulations stricken, due to judge determining there was a failure to do proper cost benefit analysis.

So it seems that safety can now be judicially compromised due to an insufficient (unknown, or faulty, etc.) cost benefit calculation.

https://www.ogj.com/general-interest/government/ar...?

--Einstein gave the same test to students every year. When asked why he would do something like that, "Because the answers had changed."

There's always been a cost/benefit aspect to safety, although not always calculated, that's not just "now". If it's something obvious like blowing oneself up, no need for calculations. If you're wondering whether you should regulate Gizmo X in automobiles at a cost of $1,000 per car, when it will save 0.001% of accidental deaths, well, that's where the cost/benefit comes in.

The event occurred in Mexico. Granted the law may not be enforced consistently in Mexico, but Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) is an Agency of the US Department of Transportation.

Failure to follow proper procedures has resulted in federal regulations being canned by US courts a number of times. I chose to blame politicians that write defective law when this happens. Political problems rarely have purely engineering solutions.

It's time for comic relief.
https://youtu.be/BKorP55Aqvg
https://youtu.be/mokllJ_Sz_g

All the court is saying is that the costs to society must outweigh the benefits to the company.

So, if there is a million dollar loss to society because a bunch of children died from 80% burns to their bodies and it would cost the company more than a million dollars to prevent that, the rule is struck down.
---
Edit: from the article:

Quote:

PHMSA issued the sweeping pipeline safety rule in response to congressional mandates and recommendations from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) after the 2010 San Bruno, Calif., natural gas pipeline explosion that killed 8, injured 58, and destroyed over 35 homes, and a 2010 oil pipeline rupture in Marshall, Mich., that spilled up to 1 million gal of crude oil into a tributary of the Kalamazoo River.

Apparently the court is OK with that happening again.

Yes. My point exactly. A safety regulation was stricken by a judge who has no clue as to what removal of that safety regulation means in terms of safety (no other reason mentioned, apparent or implied in the article here), because s/he was only concerned with the cost benefit ratio (which still remains unknown, because the judge considered it faulty). This is regulation by judiciary, those least qualified to do so, and imo, abject stupidity. The regulation should have been left in place at least until a proper cost benefit ratio was determined, at which time it should be reevaluated in terms of cost benefit and the appropriate risk management matrix.

As it is today, Americans appear to be left exposed to what the regulating authority deems is a risky use of this welding practice on high pressure pipelines.

I agree that there may be times when obvious is obvious, but there are cases where obvious is not always obvious. Complex systems often have no obvious effects at all until "emergent behaviors" are discovered. This is one of those emergent behaviors where the frequency of the welding was once thought to have no effects whatsoever, but the subsequent recent data has shown otherwise. At this time it may pay to be conservative and follow these regulations until further evidence is acquired, but the judge says, "No. Do not worry. I don't know shit about welding, but it looks good to me."

I am not comforted.

So, what do we do today? Continue with our risky welding practice, contradicting latest findings? If the pipeline fails, will this judge pay the costs? Who will be liable? How long will it take to resolve this issue. What do we do now? Our own study? Make and follow our own procedure? If it doesn't work, are we liable. If we use the most Conservative approach, then the judge has done nothing, but confuse the issues at hand. The judge is in control. The lawyers make money. We are at risk. Perfect solution.

Defective laws can be a problem. If its a legal issue let the lawyers correct it. If its and engineering or safety defect, let the engineers correct it and amend the law. An independent determination by a judge is not an answer to either question. It only prioritizes political "solutions" rather than those based on other considerations, such as safety and integrity. This example, I think proves that conclusion. "Strike the regulation." Where is the safety in that? Do you feel better about a pipeline crossing your land because it may be cheaper? How did this judge help you? Did this judge make a just decision. I don't know. He didn't even have a good cost benefit analysis to make that decision. Now I don't know if the risk was justifiyingly small to make a cost reduction worth it or not. Not that I was going to save any money either way. Its just arbitrary judicial regulation. How is that better?

TCi4, I have not got it backwards. I think I'm same as you. ASME engineers wrote codes for all this stuff. B31.4 and 8 for pipelines. No problem for me. That's how it should be. Those codes have been mostly adopted into the CFR pipeline regulations word for word. PHMSA tends to make clarifications, rather than new code. The biggest difference is that CFRs are often 20yrs behind the times. Mostly because of recent polarisation, nothing can hardly be accomplished by Congress in the way of writing any new law, or what is written is watered down to nothing. For example, the new regulatory requirements are safety and integrity heavy to correspond to ASME B31.4 and .8 changes that have not yet made it into CFRs, because pretty much the pipeline industry can cut or keep bits they don't like or want out of it even as the procedure is now, and even if those were written by their very own engineers working in cooperation with ASME. And company lawyers are objecting to EVERYTHING they possibly can, regardless of who wrote it. I'm sure you have noticed that "Object to everything. Nothing new. Nothing additional. Take it back 50 yrs." is the new SOP.

I am all for engineers writing codes that get adopted as law. That's the only thing that makes technical sense. What I object to is judges cutting it up however they like based SOLELY on THEIR OWN INTETPRETATIONS. That's judicial regulation. And IMO, far worse then defective clauses that sometimes are the result of the logical process we have had up until now. Those can usually be corrected while temporary guidance is provided by regulating authorities. Not now. All stuff has the potential to be countered by other courts and delayed years and years until SCOTUS blesses us with their final opinions. We see how well that's not working. When it comes down to political vote, let's see how high engineering competency, system integrity and public safety weigh in.

There are no more engineering clarifications. Everything has become subject to "political clarification".

--Einstein gave the same test to students every year. When asked why he would do something like that, "Because the answers had changed."

Quote (3DDave)

All the court is saying is that the costs to society must outweigh the benefits to the company.

That's quite interesting. For comparison, the position in the UK is that a risk reduction measure should be enacted unless the cost of doing so is grossly disproportionate to the value of the reduction in risk. There isn't a set-in-stone definition for "grossly disproportionate" - our policy was to apply a factor of twenty.

A.

I believe 3Ddave was being fecicious, but that can easily be the result of this SCOTUS ruling. It puts to sleep the logic of the map you mention.

Before it was compare costs of mitigation to the sum of probability of occurrence of each risk x expected value of corresponding damages. Build it only if costs were still acceptable. (You could still make a profit). You could put a value on deaths of some sort, if it helped you decide. Or solve for the value you place on death, if you had a Max cost of risk dollar figure and then see if the lawyers thought you could keep payouts under that figure. Naturally there were always concerns on that particular value, as it is rather subjective. It was typically whatever value the lawyer told you to use. In the Lowel Massachussetts pipeline explosion, which damaged some 131 houses and killed one person, it turned out to be $ 1 billion, loss of face and stock value, company forced to sell their state gas system distribution operation and vacate the state. All for improper supervision of repair work contractor. Boeing is still not sure of what their mistakes cost. Many billions above the Lowel disaster.

Theoretically Boeing can ask a judge to vacate any air worthiness directive that might apply to Max8 recertification and if the judge agrees, they're done. It flies today. All regulations are up in the air now. What will the judges decide tomorrow? Next week Will? Will they decide the same in each court? When will we know the answers. What do we do about it today. All unknowns. We are flying blind.

--Einstein gave the same test to students every year. When asked why he would do something like that, "Because the answers had changed."

Paper on - Cost-Benefit Analysis in Federal Agency Rulemaking dated March 8, 2022 - attached. This is not a new requirement.

Quote (https://www.ogj.com/general-interest/government/ar...)

A federal appeals court told the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration to rewrite several sections of a major pipeline safety rule in effect since May 2023.

The three-judge panel of the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit found that PHMSA, part of the Transportation Department, failed to follow the Administrative Procedures Act’s (APA) requirement regarding cost-benefit analyses in 4 of the 5 standards challenged by a natural gas pipeline trade association.

The court found that the rule making was defective, this is something they are supposed to do. The agency can repair the rule, and reissue it. It was not just the cost benefit analysis, part of the new rule was not advertised correctly (per the cited article).

I wounder how this sort of situation works out in Mexico?

• https://files.engineering.com/getfile.aspx?folder=e27d4822-4056-49d1-b498-0

What is the number 1 common sense rule when cutting or welding on a tank that had combustible liquid.

Worker safety is a problem everywhere. Especially where workers can be easily exploited, or have a sense of duty to complete an assignment even when conditions may not be entirely safe to do so. Looking back, I can see I fell into that trap more than once. Things that I simply should not have done, but felt compelled to do to complete my assignment. Swinging from platform to workboat on the Tarzan rope in 6 ft waves and a 30-50mph headwind wasn't too smart. Hit the side of the boat the first time. I even did it again. The deck hands pulled me in. Babysitting a control valve for a month in the middle of guerilla territory 50 miles from town at the height of the Colombia war in 1986. Trying to reach a valve too far off the tank rooftop swinging from a rope 50ft in the air. Getting in a helicopter that was obviously overloaded and taking off in thick fog. I worked at one gas company that had so many pipeline explosions (1-2/week), due to complete disregard for corrosion control, that I immediately quit when we finally drilled a well into a gas field with a lethal H2S content. And that's only the stuff that happened at work.

--Einstein gave the same test to students every year. When asked why he would do something like that, "Because the answers had changed."

1503
As a youngster I did bone head mistakes , and some how I survived. But never work related.
In this case management should be prosecuted for allowing a very bad dumb
Mistake. Mexico while I don't know for sure may or may not have more relax laws.
But a work related accident like this killed people.
There is a reason seasoned skilled lead men or women are in charge.
And safety rules are in place.
Accidents happens but this was negligence.

The thing is, back then I thought I was supposed to do those things. I never thought I should have said "no way in hell I'm doing that." So guys, just don't do that kind of stuff.

--Einstein gave the same test to students every year. When asked why he would do something like that, "Because the answers had changed."