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Clean Hydrogen Partnership

Fire on a CGH2 bottles truck

Event

Event ID
199
Quality
Description
A truck loaded with 400 hydrogen bottles crashed into a concrete barrier and tipped over. After tipping over, the vehicle slid about 150 meters across the road. The hydrogen was released, ignited producing an explosion and eventually involving the tractor in the fire.
Around 50 firefighters were busy extinguishing the fire for two hours. To reduce the risk of explosion, the fire brigade cooled the gas bottles with extinguishing water at the scene of the fire. The motorway was closed for around eight hours.

The driver's cab burned out completely in the accident. The damage to the vehicle to 200,000 euros, without counting the damage to the highway surface
Event Initiating system
Classification of the physical effects
Hydrogen Release and Ignition
Nature of the consequences
Macro-region
Europe
Country
Germany
Date
Main component involved?
Valve (Generic)
How was it involved?
Rupture & Formation Of A Flammable H2-Air Mixture
Initiating cause
Impact, Rollover, Crash
Root causes
Root CAUSE analysis
The INITIATING CAUSE was the crash of the vehicle against a concrete barrier.

Facility

Application
Hydrogen Transport And Distribution
Sub-application
CGH2 cylinders truck
Hydrogen supply chain stage
Hydrogen Transport (No additional details provided)
All components affected
cylinders
Location type
Open
Operational condition
Pre-event occurrences
The trailer was transporting 400 bottles. The report mention 200 -l bottles. By looking at the picture, the bottles appear standard 50 litre, 200 bar bottles. Assuming they were all full, it give a total hydrogen inventory of approximately 290 kg.

Emergency & Consequences

Number of injured persons
1
Number of fatalities
0
Currency
Euro
Property loss (onsite)
200000
Post-event summary
The driver's cab burned out completely in the accident. The damage to the vehicle to 200,000 euros, without counting the damage to the highway surface

Event Nature

Release type
gas
Involved substances (% vol)
H2 100%
Released amount
290
Actual pressure (MPa)
20
Design pressure (MPa)
20
Presumed ignition source
Not reported

References

Reference & weblink

Online news WELT<br />
https://www.welt.de/regionales/nrw/article842473/Gastransporter-explodi… />
(accessed December 2024)

A better quality picture from Online news WELT<br />
https://www.welt.de/regionales/nrw/article842473/Gastransporter-explodi…

JRC assessment