Explosive and Chemical Safety

There seems to be no general acceptance of what is implied by the term Safety and different authors have identified different ways to denote it. Iicht has identified five distinct ways in which the term Safety is used. 

Everyone faces varying degrees of risks at home, in the workplace or on the road. An example of an acceptable risk would be an act almost everyone of us performs many times a week opening our mail. Have you ever got a cut while tearing open 

High Energy Materials Propellants, Explosives and Pyrotechnics. Jai Prakash Agrawal Copyright 2010 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH Co. KGaA, Weinheim ISBN 978-3-527-32610-5 

---

This book is split into six well-defined chapters Salient Features of Explosives, Status of Explosives, Processing and Assessment of Explosives, Propellants, Pyrotechnics, and Explosive and Chemical Safety. Further, the book includes an exhaustive bibliography at the end of each chapter (total references cited are more than 1000). It also provides the status of HEMs reported mainly during the last 50 years, including their prospects for military applications in the light of their physical, chemical, thermal and explosive properties. The likely development areas for further research are also highlighted. Accidents, fires and explosions in the explosive and chemical industries may be eliminated or minimized if the safety measures described in this book are implemented. 

The Range Rule also confirms this problem with deterioration of explosive fillers. It states, As they deteriorate over time, some explosives may form sensitive crystals that could detonate if subjected to heat, shock or friction. Chemical munitions contain toxics that present additional safety risks. High explosive fillers, deteriorated explosives, and chemical munitions are a few examples of Military Munitions where the filler itself requires special safety considerations, even if the fusing mechanism is no longer capable of firing. ... 

It is possible to feed explosives and chemical agents simultaneously. These are then, as all other organics, oxidised to carbon dioxide, water, nitrous oxides and mineral salts. The system has been praised in several publications for its built-in safety and environmental compatibility. 

Caution should be used when storing, operating, or repairing a battery because of the chemical, explosive, and electrical safety hazards associated with all batteries. 

Explosives and fuze safety is the process used to prevent premature, unintentional, or unauthorized initiation of explosives and devices containing explosives and to minimize the effects of explosions, combustion, toxicity, and any other deleterious effects. Explosives safety includes all mechanical, chemical, biological, electrical, and environmental hazards associated with explosives or EM environmental effects. Equipment, systems, or procedures and processes whose malfunction would cause unacceptable mishap risk to manufacturing, handling, transportation, maintenance, storage, release, testing, delivery, firing, or disposal of explosives are also included. 

Chemical safety data sheets for individual compounds should be consulted for detailed information. Precautions for the higher aldehydes are essentially those for most other reactive organic compounds, and should include adequate ventilation in areas where high exposures are expected fire and explosion precautions and proper instmction of employees in use of respiratory, eye, and skin protection. 

A wide variety of special-purpose incinerators (qv) with accompanying gas scmbbers and soHd particle collectors have been developed and installed in various demilitarisation faciUties. These include flashing furnaces that remove all vestiges of explosive from metal parts to assure safety in handling deactivation furnaces, to render safe small arms and nonlethal chemical munitions fluidized-bed incinerators that bum slurries of ground up propellants or explosives in oil and rotary kilns to destroy explosive and contaminated waste and bulk explosive. 

Annual Proceedings of the Safety Seminars, Dept, of Defense, Explosive Safety Board, Washington, D.C. International symposia on explosives and closely related subjects are excellent sources of information, ie, international symposia on detonation symposia on combustion symposia on chemical problems connected with the stabiUty of explosives international pyrotechnics seminars symposia on compatibiUty of plastics and other materials with explosives, propellants, and pyrotechnics, and processing of explosives, propellants, and ingredients and symposia on explosives and pyrotechnics Mineral Industy Surveys, U.S. Bureau of Mines, Pittsburgh, Pa. Periodic pubhcations dedicated primarily to explosive studies in Propellants and Explosives Journal of Ha yardous Materials, and apparent consumption of industrial explosives and blasting agents in the United States. 

Tables 16 and 17 Hst tke analytical test methods for different properties of interest. The Manufacturing Chemists Association, Inc. (MCA) has pubUshed the Chemical Safety Data Sheet SD 63, which describes in detail procedures for safe handling of use of toluene (46). The Interstate Commerce Commission classifies toluene as a flammable Hquid. Accordingly, it must be packaged in authorized containers, and shipping must comply with ICC regulations. Properties related to safe handling are autoignition temperature, 536°C explosive limits, 1.27—7.0 vol % in air and flash point 4.4°C, closed cup.

CCPS G-26. Guidelines for Evaluation Process Plant Buildings for External Explosions and Eires. American Institute of Chemical Engineers, Center for Chemical Process Safety, New York. 

Process Safety A discipline that focuses on the prevention and mitigation of fires, explosions, and accidental chemical releases at process facilities. Excludes classic worker health and safety issues involving working surfaces, ladders, protective equipment, etc. 

Process Safety Management of Highly Hazardons Chemicals Explosives and Blasting Agents Einal Rnle, Federal Register, Vol. 57, No. 36, Eeh-rnary 24, 1992. 

---