![]() ![]() ![]() The location made sense in that regard, but this incident highlights the risks associated with locating a large tank (especially one known to be leaky) in a populated area. The location was convenient because it was close to the harbor that brought the molasses from Cuba and near the railroad used to transfer the molasses to a distillery. The tank was also located in a neighborhood. The tank was huge, holding about 2 million gallons of molasses at the time of the accident. The size and location of this tank were additional factors that played into this disaster. The company’s response to the leaks? They painted the tank brown so that the molasses leaks would be less noticeable. The tank also leaked badly, to the point that it was common for local residents to use buckets to collect the molasses for household use. There are many reports that the tank was known to rumble, creak and make ominous noises. Investigators also determined that basic safety testing, such as filling the tank with water before use, was not performed because of schedule pressure.Īnother important element worth understanding in this disaster is that warning signs that all was not well with the tank were repeatedly ignored. There have also been questions about whether or not the construction was done properly. There was no engineer involved in the design of the tank and it was basically built as quickly and cheaply as possible. It was calculated that the tank walls were only half as thick as they should have been. More significantly, investigators determined that the strength of the tank was inadequate. As the temperature increases, molasses may ferment more, creating more carbon dioxide in the tank and causing the internal pressure of the tank to increase. Investigators think the pressure in the tank may have increased in the days preceding the accident because the temperature had increased significantly (from 2☏ to 41☏). So why did the tank collapse? The pressure inside the tank exceeded the strength of the tank (ability to hold the pressure). To view an intermediate level Cause Map of this accident, click on the thumbnail above. In order to create a Cause Map, ‘Why’ questions are asked and answers are visually laid out to instinctively show the cause-and-effect relationships. A Cause Map, a visual format for performing a root cause analysis, can be created to help understand the many causes that contributed to this issue. Once the tank collapsed, the molasses flowed out relatively quickly (think ketchup when it finally flows out of a glass bottle), moving fast enough that that people were swept up in the flood, and then it quickly settled into thick goo that made it very difficult for people to escape and rescue workers to reach victims.Īfter one wraps their mind around the fact that molasses can be deadly, the next natural question is: what caused this accident? As with nearly all accidents of this scope, there isn’t a single, simple root cause, but rather a number of causes that led to the accident. Molasses is a non-Newtonian fluid and a wave of molasses does not behave the same as a wave of water. The word molasses is more likely to bring to mind baked goodies rather than destruction or danger, but a flood of molasses is actually more dangerous than a comparable flood of water. The rescue efforts went on for days and cleaning up this disaster is estimated to have taken 87,000 man-hours. The resulting flood of molasses was two stories tall and killed 21 people, injured 150 more, and did 100 million dollars of damage (in today’s dollars). In 1919, a tank holding about 2 million gallons of molasse s collapsed in the North End neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts. ![]()
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