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Okanagan Springs Brewery Explosion

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Duct Tape
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Okanagan Springs Brewery Explosion

Post by Duct Tape »

Just a bit of flotsam and jetsam in my reading the Globe and Mail today.

Its a bit of a candidate for the various FailBlog and "You're Doing it Wrong" pages of the interwebs. Too bad there's no pictures of a river of beer flooding Vernon!!
Globe & Mail wrote:
Strange brew: Exploding beer vat douses B.C. street in suds
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/nat ... le1649621/

The Okanagan Springs brewery is in clean-up mode after fermenting vat exploded

Vernon, B.C. — The Canadian Press Published on Friday, Jul. 23, 2010 11:37AM EDT Last updated on Friday, Jul. 23, 2010 11:40AM EDT

This cream beer was no milquetoast.

The Okanagan Springs brewery in Vernon, B.C., is cleaning up after its latest batch of cream beer became a cream bomb, blowing apart the fermenting vat.

The Thursday afternoon blast was powerful enough to tear an aluminum loading door off its hinges, sending 32,000 litres of fermented foam flooding across a downtown street in the North Okanagan city.

Fortunately, no-one was seriously injured, although WorkSafe B.C. is investigating after one worker suffered a minor hand injury.

A well-timed rainstorm flushed most of the beer into the sewers but cleanup was a little more extensive inside the plant as workers swept up shards from several hundred pulverized beer bottles.

A build-up of carbon dioxide is blamed for the blast.
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Bobsy
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Post by Bobsy »

Brings to mind the Boston Molasses Disaster:

"The Boston Molasses Disaster, also known as the Great Molasses Flood and the Great Boston Molasses Tragedy, occurred on January 15, 1919, in the North End neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts in the United States. A large molasses storage tank burst, and a wave of molasses rushed through the streets at an estimated 35 mph (56 km/h), killing 21 and injuring 150. The event has entered local folklore, and residents claim that on hot summer days, the area still smells of molasses."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Molasses_Disaster

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Tapsucker
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Post by Tapsucker »

The Creemore Springs anti-expansion people should take note.

How many of you homebrewers lie awake at night worrying about what's in the basement? :P
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Post by Kel Varnsen »

Bobsy wrote:Brings to mind the Boston Molasses Disaster:

"The Boston Molasses Disaster, also known as the Great Molasses Flood and the Great Boston Molasses Tragedy, occurred on January 15, 1919, in the North End neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts in the United States. A large molasses storage tank burst, and a wave of molasses rushed through the streets at an estimated 35 mph (56 km/h), killing 21 and injuring 150. The event has entered local folklore, and residents claim that on hot summer days, the area still smells of molasses."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Molasses_Disaster
I have read that story a few times. There was also the London Beer Flood of 1814. 8 people drowned when 1,4 million litres of beer flooeded into the streets. One guy died of alcohol poisioning the next day.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Beer_Flood

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Post by phirleh »

Kel Varnsen wrote:One guy died of alcohol poisioning the next day.
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phirleh
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Post by phirleh »

Here's an actual picture of the fermenter
OUCH!
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Malam cerevisiam facieus in cathedram stercoris

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Rob Creighton
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Post by Rob Creighton »

This is Sapparo/Sleeman's second storage tank disaster in a decade.

The 400 HL they lost here is small compared to the 4000 Hl lost in Guelph when the supports on a fermentor gave way allowing it to rocket into the floor creating an accordian where a tank used to exist and taking out the two adjacent tanks. One of their brewers described it as a tidal wave of beer that shot out an emergency exit and rolled down Clair Road. These guys are having some serious safety issues.

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Post by Queef »

why would they not vent the tank? or have a pressure relief valve on it? how is this even possibly?
Is there some kind of quickening on the process that would happen if you didn't vent or use the valve? Is it a cost cut?
Thats pretty brutal.
it's beer o'clock.

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Rob Creighton
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Post by Rob Creighton »

Queef wrote:why would they not vent the tank? or have a pressure relief valve on it? how is this even possibly?
Is there some kind of quickening on the process that would happen if you didn't vent or use the valve? Is it a cost cut?
Thats pretty brutal.
They generally have the best of everything. The vent or vent system failed.

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saints_gambit
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Post by saints_gambit »

Gordon Lightfoot should probably get to work on a song to commemorate the disaster.
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Post by icemachine »

saints_gambit wrote:Gordon Lightfoot should probably get to work on a song to commemorate the disaster.
ROFL, But who will make the beer commemorating the song?
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saints_gambit
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Post by saints_gambit »

Probably Great Lakes. :)

Since Gord wasn't available, I've updated my blog with a Lightfoot style disaster ballad to console the survivors.
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Post by Flood »

Glad nobody was hurt...
beer up

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Post by Freddie Fudpucker »

This line taken from the Master Brewers Association of the Americas Volume Two Fermentation, Cellaring, and Packaging Operations, page 87, part C. Pressure and Vacuum-Relief Valves pretty much sums up what didn't happen at Okanagan Spring Brewery:

“Any closed tanks must be designed and piped so that no possibility exists for accidentally creating excessive pressure unless the tank is suitably equipped with protective pressure-relieving devices”.
Last edited by Freddie Fudpucker on Mon Aug 09, 2010 12:16 pm, edited 4 times in total.

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Post by kinguy »

phirleh wrote:
Kel Varnsen wrote:One guy died of alcohol poisioning the next day.
Image
I'm not in the picture...but I was there!

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