According to mrsgator88 :
"Chris Lewis" wrote in message
...

And that's more dangerous than BBQ tank refilling stations?

In some ways propane is more dangerous, because it's heavier than
air, and flows along the ground almost like water seeking low points.

There have been a number of propane rail car accidents where the propane
flowed downhill for quite a distance before it encountered something
that ignited it. That wouldn't happen with hydrogen.

Well, I was thinking about the hydrogen car being in a collision with a
semi. She'd be blowed up REAL good. With proprane, I only thought "how
much can happen between the hardware store and my house".

You do know that there are propane-powered cars, don't you?

Propane car rail accidents never occurred to me.

They do to me, because my grandfather was transportation manager for a very
large oil company (since morphed twice), and he got to supervise the results
as well as interact with his peers in industry/government on how to avoid the
problems repeating themselves.

There was a major accident back I think in the late 50's/early 60's where
a propane derailment just north of Toronto seemed to be just fine - no fire,
everything seemed secure.

Hours later, while they were trying to assess/extricate stuff, a safety OP
valve on one car popped, and the propane flowed downhill almost half a mile
before encountering an ignition source. Then flashed back to the derailment
site... Which happened to be adjacent to a fuel storage area... It didn't
all go up, but it wasn't nice at all. Fortunately, there was no homes
near it.

[This isn't the "great Mississauga train derailment" which was many years
later, it had propane, and it burned reasonably innocuously - it was
spectacular because they had to evacuate something like 200,000 people
for a couple days. The thing they were scared of was the chlorine cars
letting loose... No, it wasn't my grandfather's company ;-)]
--
Chris Lewis, Una confibula non set est
It's not just anyone who gets a Starship Cruiser class named after them.