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RDX (abbreviation of "Research Department eXplosive") or hexogen, among other names, is an organic compound with the formula (O2N2CH2)3. It is a white solid without smell or taste, widely used as an explosive. Chemically, it is classified as a nitroamine alongside HMX, which is a more energetic explosive than TNT. It was used widely in World War II and remains common in military applications.
Dynamite is an explosive made of nitroglycerin, sorbents, and stabilizers. It was invented by the Swedish chemist and engineer Alfred Nobel in Geesthacht, Northern Germany, and patented in 1867. It rapidly gained wide-scale use as a more robust alternative to black powder.
Ashton-under-Lyne is a market town in Tameside, Greater Manchester, England. The population was 45,198 at the 2011 census. Historically in Lancashire, it is on the north bank of the River Tame, in the foothills of the Pennines, 6.2 miles (10.0 km) east of Manchester.
On 21 September 2001, an explosion occurred at the AZF fertiliser factory in Toulouse, France, belonging to the Grande Paroisse branch of the Total group.
A World War I explosive factory, which was to be later known as NEF Pembrey was built, by Nobel's Explosives, with British Government approval, near the village of Pembrey, Carmarthenshire, Wales. The factory was built on a site consisting of mainly sandhills and sand dunes to provide some protection against damage caused by an explosion. Its main product was TNT (Trinitrotoluene) used for shell filling. The same site was used in World War II to build another explosive factory ROF Pembrey, which also made TNT.
There have been many extremely large explosions, accidental and intentional, caused by modern high explosives, boiling liquid expanding vapour explosions (BLEVEs), older explosives such as gunpowder, volatile petroleum-based fuels such as gasoline, and other chemical reactions. This list contains the largest known examples, sorted by date. An unambiguous ranking in order of severity is not possible; a 1994 study by historian Jay White of 130 large explosions suggested that they need to be ranked by an overall effect of power, quantity, radius, loss of life and property destruction, but concluded that such rankings are difficult to assess.
The Silvertown explosion occurred in Silvertown in West Ham, Essex on Friday, 19 January 1917 at 6:52 pm. The blast occurred at a munitions factory that was manufacturing explosives for Britain's First World War military effort. Approximately 50 long tons of trinitrotoluene (TNT) exploded, killing 73 people and injuring 400 more, as well as causing substantial damage in the local area. This was not the first, last, largest, or the most deadly explosion at a munitions facility in Britain during the war; an explosion at Faversham involving 200 long tons of TNT killed 105 in 1916, and the National Shell Filling Factory, Chilwell, exploded in 1918, killing 137.
Nixon is an unincorporated community located within Edison Township in Middlesex County, New Jersey, United States. It was named after Lewis Nixon, a manufacturer and community leader. Soon after the outbreak of World War I, Nixon established a massive volatile chemicals processing facility there, known as the Nixon Nitration Works. It was the site of the 1924 Nixon Nitration Works disaster, a massive explosion and resulting fire that killed 20 persons and destroyed several square miles around the plant.
Faversham, in Kent, England, has claims to be the cradle of the UK's explosives industry: it was also to become one of its main centres. The first gunpowder plant in the UK was established in the 16th century, possibly at the instigation of the abbey at Faversham. With their estates and endowments, monasteries were keen to invest in promising technology.
The 1924 Nixon Nitration Works disaster was an explosion and fire that claimed many lives and destroyed several square miles of New Jersey factories. It began on March 1, 1924, about 11:15 a.m., when an explosion destroyed a building in Nixon, New Jersey used for processing ammonium nitrate. The explosion touched off fires in surrounding buildings in the Nixon Nitration Works that contained other highly flammable materials. The disaster killed twenty people, destroyed forty buildings, and demolished the "tiny industrial town of Nixon, New Jersey."
Low Moor is a village in the metropolitan borough of the City of Bradford in West Yorkshire, England.
The Billingham Manufacturing Plant is a large chemical works based in the Borough of Stockton-on-Tees, England. In agricultural terms, it is one of the most important factories in Britain.
The Clayton Aniline Company Ltd. was a British manufacturer of dyestuffs, founded in 1876 by Charles Dreyfus in Clayton, Manchester.
Camille Edouard Dreyfus was a Swiss chemist. He and his brother Henri Dreyfus invented Celanese, an acetate yarn. He founded The Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation in honour of his brother.
Henri Dreyfus was a Swiss inventor of the modern weaving loom. He and his brother Camille Dreyfus also invented Celanese, an acetate yarn.
Silvertown War Memorial, also known as Silvertown Explosion Memorial, is a war memorial in Silvertown, in East London. It serves as a memorial for the workers at the Brunner Mond chemical plant who were killed on active service during the First and Second World Wars, while also commemorating the people killed in the Silvertown explosion on 17 January 1917. It became a Grade II listed building in 1999.
AZF was the name of a chemical factory in Toulouse, France, which exploded on 21 September 2001. The blast was equivalent to 20-40 tons of TNT, producing an earthquake with a magnitude of 3.4, and was heard 80 km away. The incident resulted in 29 deaths and left 2,500 wounded. Damages paid by insurance companies exceeded 1.5 billion euros.
The Trojan Powder Company was an American manufacturer of explosives founded in 1904 that made nitro-starch powder. It had a manufacturing complex in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and another facility at Roberts Landing near San Lorenzo, California. The company thrived during World War I (1914–18), continued research and development in the interwar-period, and during World War II operated a large facility in Sandusky, Ohio, under contract to the army. After the war, production scaled back. A facility in Oregon was sold for use by the Trojan Nuclear Power Plant. In 1967 Trojan Powders became a division of Commercial Solvents Corporation (CSC). It was later acquired by the Ensign-Bickford Company.
The memorial to the victims of the 1916 Faversham Munitions Explosion is a Grade II* listed building in Love Lane cemetery, in Faversham, Kent. Unveiled in 1917, it incorporates a granite Celtic cross and the granite structures surrounding a mass grave for 73 people killed by the Faversham explosion on 2 April 1916, and a nearby freestanding stone which records the names of another 35 who were buried elsewhere. The memorial became a Grade II listed building in 1989, and was upgraded to Grade II* in March 2016 just before the centenary of the explosion.
The memorial to munitions workers of National Filling Factory No.6, Chilwell is a Grade II listed building on the north side of Chetwynd Road inside Chetwynd Barracks, in Chilwell, near Nottingham. It commemorates the workers who died in accidents at National Shell Filling Factory, Chilwell during the First World War, particularly the large explosion on 1 July 1918. The large free-standing pyramidal monument, enclosed by chains carried on shell casings, was unveiled in 1919 and became a Grade II listed building in 1987.