The Explosion of the Sierra Chemical Company

Investigators with the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives are sifting through debris in the Texas town of West, following a deadly explosion at a fertilizer plant. Fourteen people died and more than 200 injured in a blast that devastated a four to five-block radius.

It brings back the memory of another blast nearly 15-years earlier. I was pulling out of the drive way of the Sierra Nevada Chapter of the American Red Cross, heading for the Sierra Chemical Company to teach a CPR and first aid class to their employees.

It was jus’ before eight that morning when an explosion rocked the chemical plant that manufactures dynamite, killing four people. About a dozen people were inside the plant at the time, in the hills above Lockwood, about 10 miles east of Reno.

In addition to the four deaths, six people received injuries that Wednesday morning, January 7th, 1998. Had the class been scheduled at eight like usual, I could have been among those numbers.

Barbara Bradley, who lived across from the plant said the first blast knocked her out of bed. She went to see what happened, and the second explosion threw her to the floor.

“It really shook the whole house,” Bradley added. “Pictures moved back and forth across the walls. It scared me half to death.”

Investigators believe the first explosion occurred in Booster Room 2, where workers were mixing explosives. Less than four seconds later a second explosion in the Pentaerythritol Tetranitrate (PETN) Building that housed chemicals used in the mixtures happened.

That first explosion was likely triggered when a worker started a blade in a mixing bowl unaware that an explosive mixture had been left there the night before. Evidence suggests a worker left 50-100 pounds of base mixture in a large mixing pot and it stratified and hardened overnight.

The next morning, when the same worker turned the mixer’s motor on, the mixing blade embedded in the mixture detonated the explosives. The blast left a crater 40 feet wide, scattering debris over a 2,000-yard radius, breaking windows over a mile away, shaking seismic needles at the University of Nevada, Reno and could be felt as far away as Fernley, 20 miles to the east.

The shock wave also detonated thousands of pounds of explosives, destroying the Booster Room, sending burning and flying debris that triggered a second explosion 3.5 seconds later at the building storing the PETN . One survivor, Gustavo Alcala said he and other workers found themselves trapped  after the second blast.

“I yelled for help from my co-workers,” Alcala told investigators, “but they couldn’t hear me.”

Alcala said he and some of the trapped workers found a hole in the side of the building and crawled out carrying their severely burned co-worker, Benigno Orozco.

This was backed-up by Storey County Sheriff’s Sergeant Bill Petty, who was the first witness to arrive at the scene.

“There were four men staggering out of the area, and they were dragging a fifth,” Petty said.

The plant is about a mile from Interstate 80, where motorists could see the black smoke well after the blasts. The plant itself is in a canyon and couldn’t be seen from the freeway.