Hurricane Harvey has come and gone through Texas, leaving behind a trail of damage and suffering. In addition to the people who lost their lives, many buildings and communities have been destroyed throughout the storm. One of these areas was a chemical plant located in Crosby TX, which had two explosions on 8/31/17.
An article from The Washington Post explains that the explosions were caused from a tank of liquid organic peroxides, which are known to be extremely flammable. One thing that surprised me about the article was that they actually dived into the structure of oxygen peroxides, as opposed to just talking about it in one sentence. In the article is a brief summary of the oxygen peroxides and examples of how they can be used (citing hydrogen peroxide and benzoyl peroxide being used to treat wounds and acne respectively).
Because the oxygen peroxides are flammable, chemists take extra precaution in the way that they're handled. Chemist William Carroll stated in the article that “[oxygen peroxide] has to be handled in a certain way” in regards to the location of the chemical plant, which was in a rural area as opposed to a downtown area in Houston. Had the plant been located in the city of Houston itself, the damage from the explosions would've most likely been worse than what actually happened.
As was discussed in the article, oxygen peroxides are flammable compounds containing two linked oxygen atoms (picture below on the left). When heated up, the peroxides will decompose and often form flammable vapors which was the cause of the explosion in Crosby. An example of this would be for the reaction of hydrogen peroxide with heat. Hydrogen peroxide will break down into water and oxygen when heated. The excess of oxygen atoms will often result in the peroxide becoming flammable. This is the reason why hydrogen peroxide is present in brown bottles, as the bottle protects it from the light/heat so it won't decompose.
One thing that the article did not mention (nor the Arkema plant's official statement on the issue) was which specific oxygen peroxides were present at the site of the explosion. Although the specific chemicals were not named, the article did state that the chemicals would burn quickly enough so that they could not be swept away by the floodwaters.
Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2017/08/31/the-extremely-flammable-chemical-behind-the-fire-in-the-flooded-texas-plant/?utm_term=.b6d2523956f9
Author of Washington Post article: Ben Guarino
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