The Buncefield Explosion - the disaster story

[John Webb]

A recent publication spotted in a St. Albans bookshop is the above-titled book, described as 'An epic photo-story of the biggest blaze in peacetime Europe'.
It is 128 pages long and contains a couple of hundred photos of the fire, the firefighting and closeups of the damage both to the Buncefield site and surrounding property. The photos are accompanied by brief but informative text; there are a few minor errors in the text but these do not detract from the book. The last few pages look at the role of the depot and how Hemel Hempstead has expanded over the years to get close to it.

ISBN: 0 9552759 0 3
Published by Sceptre Education, Sceptre School, Ridgeway Avenue, DUNSTABLE, Beds., LU5 4QL
Cost: £14.95

[kurnal]

I wonder if Buncefield really was the biggest blaze in peacetime europe?

I would think that Flixborough 1974 was bigger in terms of area, duration, lost life ( 28 died) injuries ( 52 injured off site) and the fires burned for 2 weeks?

And Soveso ( excuse spelling), Chernobyl ( ditto)  may well be in there somewhere?

[John Webb]

Looking at my notes (I was part of the Fire Research team which went to Flixborough) if the pattern of damage surrounding Flixborough had been replicated at Buncefield, most of the buildings in Hemel Hempstead would have lost their windows and probably a third of the town their roofs. The damage in Hemel was much less than that, so I conclude that Flixborough was a larger explosion. It did involve around 200 tonnes of cyclohexane released under pressure and temperature, forming a well-mixed vapour cloud which was subsequently ignited. At Buncefield it was the vapour from about 300 tonnes of petrol at a relatively low temperature.
There were fires over much of the Flixborough plant for a short while. But within 24 hours only several tanks, smaller than those at Buncefield, were still burning, plus a few small fires within the badly damaged plantwork. Two days later the tank fires were all out and only the few small fires remained where it was difficult to approach them. The duration of the fire and the total quantity of fuel burnt were both well below that involved at Buncefield.
So Flixborough = Bigger bang, smaller fire than Buncefield.
I am unable to comment on detail on the other fires you mention.