BREAKING: Bus Explosion & Fire in New York City – Photos

[mrclose]

Okay .. I am no expert on the inner workings of mattresses, (I'm an 'expert' of the outsides though) but .. three or four questions arise here:

(1 Are mattress springs 'really' that strong?

(2 Buses are diesel .. right? Does diesel 'explode' or 'flash ignite' in the same way that gasoline does?

(3 Have they already tested and verified that this idea of a 'spring loaded' bomb might actually work?

(4 Is it now time to ban all mattresses everywhere!?

UPDATE: A bus and six cars were torched in the blaze.
The New York Daily News reported:

A twin-size mattress that ended up under an MTA bus is being blamed for sparking a bizarre Thursday night Brooklyn blaze that left the bus and six parked cars torched.

The S53 bus from Staten Island ran over the mattress just after 11 p.m. and dragged it across the Verrazano Bridge, a police source said.

Metal springs in the mattress apparently punctured the bus’ gas tank, setting the coach ablaze moments after the driver pulled over in Bay Ridge and evacuated passengers.

Witnesses said gas from the bus spilled into the gutter on Dahlgren Place near 92nd St., triggering a fiery stream underneath a half-dozen cars that rapidly went up in flames.

No one was injured.

BREAKING: Bus Explosion & Fire in New York City – Photos | The Gateway Pundit

[chitownchica]

Okay .. I am no expert on the inner workings of mattresses, (I'm an 'expert' of the outsides though) ...

I don't know the answers to your questions, but I gave you a H5 for the  underlined part. You made me laugh.

Carry on  .

[mrclose]

Thanks for the H5!!

It's tough for anyone to laugh at this time of morning 'or' .. maybe you live in China!?

[chitownchica]

Thanks for the H5!!

It's tough for anyone to laugh at this time of morning 'or' .. maybe you live in China!?

I'm in Chicago. Unfortunately, I'm a night owl. Doesn't work well for a day job, but it is what it is .

[mrclose]

D@MN .. Would you 'please' take Obama back!

[mrclose]

You guys have already taken one of the thugs back .. How's ole Rahm working out for you btw?

[chitownchica]

D@MN .. Would you 'please' take Obama back!

NO! When he was crowned king, someone painted a mural in my neighborhood. He looked like one of Fat Albert's cohorts. I wish I had a picture - haha.

Rahm drives the DUmmies crazy.  Gotta love that.

[txradioguy]

It's an odd explosion to say the least.

IIRC diesel doesn't explode the same way that regular gasoline does when ignited by fire.  It will burn...but not explode.  Hence the reason we used it to purn out the contents of field latrines...a.k.a. "stirring the stew".  More than likely the heat from the ignited diesel set off the gas in the parked cars resulting in the explosion.

As for the mattress and the springs puncturing the gas tank.  That sounds like an initial guess by FDNY...but if the metal on that gas tank has endured repeated winter with road salt eating away at the metal it's possible for that to happen.

[thundley4]

A mattress spring also has a very sharp point if uncoiled which could happen while dragged beneath the bus. 

[CG6468]

Are the fuel tanks on the bus still made of metal, or have they gone to plastic?

[Eupher]

Diesel fuel, while slower than gasoline to actually burn, burns with much more intensity and heat than does gasoline once it does get going. Diesel's a bigger PITA to put out once it goes up in flames for that reason.

Even still, gasoline by itself doesn't go boom all that readily -- you really have to combine it with air/oxygen to make it ignite. That's why gasoline vapors are much more dangerous than liquid gasoline.

You can even throw a match into a puddle of diesel fuel and the match will go out -- there isn't enough heat there to ignite the diesel. If you throw in an ignited flare, however, that's plenty of heat to get the diesel going.

I'm sure DLRPyro can explain this mo betta than I can.

[Eupher]

Are the fuel tanks on the bus still made of metal, or have they gone to plastic?

I would think for safety reasons they'd have to be made of steel. Plastic can rupture too easily, seems to me.

[Ralph Wiggum]

I will reserve any comment until I hear from Nadin on the true cause of this.

[DumbAss Tanker]

A mattress spring also has a very sharp point if uncoiled which could happen while dragged beneath the bus.  

I expect the cloth and foam part of the mattress caught fire, and that cooked off the fuel.  Diesel will explode just fine if you heat the container it's in and get a lot of it vaporized before it busts out and comes in contact with more oxygen and an ignition source.

It seems pretty far-fetched that a spring could do it, but most mattresses also have a much heavier-gage and stiffer metal rod frame around the spring suspension, and if anything punctured the tank directly, it was most likely the broken end of that.

[wasp69]

Fuel oils will not ignite in the same fashion fuel distillates will ignite due to flash point differences (ie gasoline flash point is -45 F and diesel is 144 F) and the amount of high density vapor at normal ambient temperatures.  The biggest hazards with fuel oils is atomizing (spraying in a fine mist) and coming into contact with a heat source, wicking into an absorbent material and having said wick come in contact with a heat source, or straight liquid fuel oil hitting a heat source that is hot enough to cause autoignition (diesel will autoignite at 410 F).

What I think may have happened is a combination of a puncture in the fuel tank, fuel oil wicking into the mattress material, a close heat source that was able to ignite the mattress material.  Any fuel that continued to leak from the tank and spread to other vehicles would have burned nice and hot for a good long while until it was smothered by foam.  So, I do believe that a bus dragging a coil spring mattress across a metal bridge could have very well started this fire.

FWIW....