{"id":3051,"date":"2013-04-20T21:13:12","date_gmt":"2013-04-21T01:13:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/?p=3051"},"modified":"2013-04-20T21:13:53","modified_gmt":"2013-04-21T01:13:53","slug":"transparency-could-have-prevented-tx-fertlizer-plant-explosion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2013\/04\/transparency-could-have-prevented-tx-fertlizer-plant-explosion.html","title":{"rendered":"Transparency could have prevented TX fertlizer plant explosion"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\r\nHas anybody checked on the various agricultural chemical plants around here?\r\nLack of transparency can kill.\r\n<\/p>\r\n<p>\r\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/2013\/04\/20\/us-usa-explosion-regulation-idUSBRE93J09N20130420\">\r\n<img decoding=\"async\" style=\"float:right;border:none;\" width=\"250\" src=\"http:\/\/s1.reutersmedia.net\/resources\/r\/?m=02&#038;d=20130420&#038;t=2&#038;i=724229387&#038;w=460&#038;fh=&#038;fw=&#038;ll=&#038;pl=&#038;r=CBRE93J0Z4F00\"><\/a>\r\nJoshua Schneyer, Ryan McNeill and Janet Roberts wrote for Reuters today,\r\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/2013\/04\/20\/us-usa-explosion-regulation-idUSBRE93J09N20130420\">\r\nTexas fertilizer company didn&#8217;t heed disclosure rules before blast<\/a>,\r\n<\/p>\r\n<blockquote>\r\n<p>\r\nThe fertilizer plant that exploded on Wednesday, obliterating part\r\nof a small Texas town and killing at least 14 people, had last year\r\nbeen storing 1,350 times the amount of ammonium nitrate that would\r\nnormally trigger safety oversight by the U.S. Department of Homeland\r\nSecurity (DHS).\r\n<\/p>\r\n<p>\r\nYet a person familiar with DHS operations said the company that owns\r\nthe plant, West Fertilizer, did not tell the agency about the\r\npotentially explosive fertilizer as it is required to do, leaving\r\none of the principal regulators of ammonium nitrate&mdash;which can\r\nalso be used in bomb making&mdash;unaware of any danger there.\r\n<\/p>\r\n<p>\r\nFertilizer plants and depots must report to the DHS when they hold\r\n400 lb (180 kg) or more of the substance. Filings this year with the\r\nTexas Department of State Health Services, which weren&#8217;t shared with\r\nDHS, show the plant had 270 tons of it on hand last year.\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n<p>\r\nThere&#8217;s more in\r\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/2013\/04\/20\/us-usa-explosion-regulation-idUSBRE93J09N20130420\">\r\nthe article<\/a>.\r\n<\/p>\r\n<p>\r\n -jsq\r\n<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Has anybody checked on the various agricultural chemical plants around here? Lack of transparency can kill. Joshua Schneyer, Ryan McNeill and Janet Roberts wrote for Reuters today, Texas fertilizer company didn&#8217;t heed disclosure rules before blast, The fertilizer plant that exploded on Wednesday, obliterating part of a small Texas town and killing at least 14 [&hellip;]","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[202,73,3],"tags":[8750,6190,3010,5487,8701,8702,12,7,8731,237,8700,6,6189],"class_list":["post-3051","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-agriculture","category-safety","category-transparency","tag-agriculture","tag-ammonium-nitrate","tag-dhs","tag-fertilizer","tag-georgia","tag-lake","tag-lowndes-area-knowledge-exchange","tag-lowndes-county","tag-safety","tag-texas","tag-transparency","tag-valdosta","tag-west"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p585fK-Nd","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3051","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3051"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3051\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3053,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3051\/revisions\/3053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3051"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3051"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3051"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}