Abstract
WHEN liquefied natural gas (LNG) is spilled onto water, a violent explosion may occur1, caused by the sudden release of energy stored in a superheated, metastable LNG phase. It is therefore termed a superheat-limit explosion (SLE)2,3. A SLE does not contain flames, but is very noisy. According to one theoretical estimate4, the explosion which can occur when LNG is spilled onto water is equivalent to 1/50 to 1/17 the explosion of a similar mass of TNT. Because the LNG would be spread over a much larger area, however, the force per unit area from such an explosion would apparently not be large.
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References
Burgess, D. S., Murphy, J. N., and Zabetakis, M. G., US Dept. of Interior, Bureau of Mines Report, S-4105 (February 1970).
Katz, D. L., Chem. Eng. Prog., 68, 68 (1972).
Katz, D. L., and Sliepcevich, C. M., Hydrocarb. Proc. Petrol. Refin., 240 (November 1971).
Anderson, R. P., and Armstrong, D. R., Proc. Third LNG Conference (Washington, DC, 1972).
Nakanishi, E., and Reid, R. C., LNG-Water Interactions (Department of Chemical Engineering, MIT, June 1971).
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YANG, K. Explosive Interaction of Liquefied Natural Gas and Organic Liquids. Nature 243, 221–222 (1973). https://doi.org/10.1038/243221a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/243221a0
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