REPORT OF EMERGENCY EXPORT CORPORATION, DATED AUGUST 27, 1946 "It was brought out at the time of discussion that experience Emergency Export Corporation had in making export shipments of grained ammonium nitrate in paper bags had brought out the fact that approximately 20 percent of the bags had been broken open upon arrival at overseas destinations. It was suggested that certain containers which were surplus to the needs of the War Department might be utilized in shipping ammonium nitrate" (R. vol. 29, p. 23261).

January 16

YEAR 1947

H. A. Campbell, chief inspector, Bureau of Explosives, writes Chief of Ordnance in alarm over boxcar fires of FGAN, stating:

"Inquiry developed that loading temperatures have been ranging from 180° to 210° F. It was also developed that it has not been uncommon to find that paper bags in which the nitrates were shipped badly charred and disintegrated when unloaded at destination. I am of the opinion that loading temperatures in this material are excessively high and continued spontaneous heating in material loaded at these temperatures is liable to result in fires in transportation. Your assistance is solicited in handling the matter so that future shipments will be cooled to a temperature not to exceed 120° F. at time of loading" (R. vol. 29, pp. 22989– 22990). [Italics supplied.]

March 7

Advice of Campbell handled this manner:

"Duncan Smith took letters from plant to D. C. and discussed with Mr. H. D. Reynolds, who answered Mr. Campbell's letter to the effect that it is not feasible to accept his recommendation" (R. vol. 29, pp. 22989-22990).

January 27

Letter from Chief of Ammunition Supply Division, Office of the Commanding General of Ordnance Department, stating in part, in reference to Campbell letter: "This matter has been discussed with Colonel Tibbitts, of the Safety and Security Division, and they have no objection to the ammonium nitrate being loaded at a maximum temperature of 190° F. It is realized that the request to not exceed 120° F. at time of loading is not practical" (R. vol. 13, p. 9444). May 28

Col. Joel E. Holmes, field director, Ordnance Department, reports to Chief Field Director of Ammunition Plants on paper bag tests, same paper bags used at Texas City:

"The Union Bag Co. has reported that ammonium nitrate dust on paper bags, upon absorbing sufficient moisture from the air to become damp will cause serious damage to the paper. ***Special tests conducted at Iowa Ordnance Plant show that the inner ply of multiwall bags suffers degradation after 24 hours heating in an oven maintained at 100° C. (212° F.) under conditions wherein the paper is embedded in a dish of ammonium nitrate fertilizer."

January 22

Union Bag & Paper Corp. report, after a series of tests, on the same bags used to sack the ammonium nitrate exploding at Texas City:

"At 90° relative humidity we found that paper in a bag will pick up moisture to a point where it has a moisture content of 15 percent or over. This amount of moisture in the bag walls, when filled with hot ammonium nitrate, will cause the disintegration which occurred. This disintegration will occur even at temperatures as low as 200° and probably lower, although we did not experiment at temperatures under 200°." [Italics supplied.]

Because of its findings, the bag company recommends:

"If this is not possible from a warehousing point of view, it would be our suggestion to reduce the packing temperature to a range of 160° F.-175° F. * * * From our understanding of your operations it is questionable if you have the facilities to warehouse these bags under the relative humidity conditions suggested. *** It has been our observation in other plants where ammonium nitrate is packed with little or no deterioration of the bags, that their packing is done within the range of approximately 160° F. to 170° F. and that they experienced none of the difficulties which currently face you. It would be our strong recommendation that if possible your packing temperature range be reduced to that noted above" (R. vol. 29, p. 23411). [Italics supplied.]

January 1947 to April 15, 1947

Testimony of Colonel Jefferds, commanding officer, Iowa Ordnance Plant: "Q. Let's move on. We are at a temperature of 250 to 258. What happened to the material at that point?-A. At that point the material is dropped down through the shaker screen.

"Q. That is the Ro-Ball screen? A. Yes, I believe that is the name. They were shaker screens.

"Q. Through the screen passed whatever the size of the screen was in the way of grains of material, is that right?-A. Yes.

"Q. Into what?-A. Into bags.

"Q. Bags immediately under your kettles, is that right?—A. That is right.

"Q. How much time elapsed occurring between the bagging under the kettles and the delivery to the sewing machines at Central Bagging?—A. Oh, 15 or 20 minutes, perhaps" (R. vol. 7, pp. 6096-6097). [Italics supplied.]

January to April 15

Colonel Jefferds, commanding officer, Iowa Ordnance Plant, testified as follows: "Q. So far as FDAP was concerned, notwithstanding what Lieutenant Colonel Meldrum sent you, and notwithstanding what you were telling them, that they could either take production or lower temperature, but that you could not give them both, you told them that, didn't you?--A. In effect, yes."

Jefferds further testifying:

"Q. FDAP never ordered you to reduce temperatures and sacrifice production, did they?-A. They never ordered us to go to 120°.

"Q. Or never less than 200°, did they, before Texas City?-A. That is correct. "Q. In fact, never less than 210° F. at Texas City, did they?-A. I believe that is also correct.'

October 30, 1946

Letter, International Paper Co., on bag damage, stating, in part:

"It is my understanding that the temperature of your material at the time it is filled into the bags is well above 212° F., and in addition, that your filled bags are normally loaded quite rapidly into cars which are closed and transshipped in the main to gulf ports, so that upon arrival at these ports the paper in the bags has not only been thoroughly dried out, but has had little if any opportunity to regain its normal moisture content" (R. vol. 29, p. 23414).

March 4, 1947

Col. Carroll H. Deitrick, now Brigadier General Deitrick, then head of Safety and Security Division of Ordnance, and executive officer to Maj. Gen. Everett S. Hughes, Chief of Ordnance, wrote Picatinny Arsenal asking for certain tests and stating:

"Because of the similarity of the accidents, and owing to the fact that the fertilizer is bagged at temperatures of approximately 190° F. to 240° F. in duplex paper bags placed immediately into boxcars under relatively restricted conditions of free air circulation, this office suspects that the fires may have resulted from the normal high temperatures fertilizer in combination with easy ignitability of the duplex paper sack" (R. vol. 30, p. 23829).

May 21

J. C. Holtz and R. L. Grant made an official investigation for the Bureau of Mines of the ammonium nitrate fertilizer exploding at Texas City entitled "Manufacture of Ammonium Nitrate Fertilizer of the Type That Exploded at Texas City." On the matter of heating and bag conditions, this was stated:

"According to plant experience (56) fertilizer packed in the multiwall paper bags at 93° C. (199° F.) does not heat further. If packed at 104° C. (219° F.) and loaded promptly into railroad cars, the asphalt in the bags begins to bleed. If packed at 110° C. (230° F.) the insides of the bags show charring, particularly if heat losses are minimized. At 118° C. (244° F.) the three inner sheets are considerably weakened by charring and embrittlement. At 150° C. (302° F.) simulated bags ignited spontaneously in 5 or 6 hours."

May 7

Col. Gordon C. Tibbitts, assistant to Col. Carroll H. Deitrick, executive officer to Maj. Gen. Everett S. Hughes, Chief of Ordnance, was ordered to Texas City to make an official investigation and report of the catastrophe there occurring. A part of that report states:

78228-56- -12

"The ammonium nitrate fertilizer on both ships, at least the greater portion, obviously detonated with high order as a result of fire. It is known that ammonium nitrate will detonate under certain conditions of elevated temperature when in the presence of carbonaceous materials. *** There is ample carbonaceous material available in the bags in which the fertilizer is packed in addition to a wide variety of contaminants in the hold of a ship with which material from broken bags would come in contact. *** Despite the fact that the bags are raised off the floor by the dunnage a broken bag will permit the nitrate to sift down through the dunnage onto the floor. This condition will always be present when the fertilizer is packed in paper bags" (R. vol. 25, pp. 21171-21172).

January to April 15

Capt. George E. McCabe, United States Coast Guard, Chief of Staff, Eighth Coast Guard District, including Texas City, testified as follows:

"Q. Now, prior to April 16-17, 1947, the dates of the great Texas City disaster, did you ever know before that time that ammonium nitrate could or might explode? A. No.

"Q. Up to that time, from the standpoint of cargo, you viewed it as a harmless material, such as cottonseed meal, or flour, or sugar, or things of that sort?— A. Yes, or coal, or anything else" (R. vol. 9, p. 7311).

April 29 to May 6

Official United States Coast Guard Board of Inquiry into explosion and fire on steamship Grandcamp, Texas City, in its finding No. 2, condemned the United States Government as follows:

"The shipping officers of the United States Army, Iowa Ordnance Plant, West Burlington, Iowa, the Cornhusk Ordnance Plant, Coplant, Nebr., and the Nebraska Ordnance Plant, Firestone, Nebr., violated section 417 of the Interstate Commerce Commission Regulations governing the transportation of explosives and other dangerous articles, dated January 7, 1941, and in effect at time of shipment by describing the substance offered for transportation by rail under a shipping name not authorized by subject regulations" (R. vol. 24, p. 20675). [Italics supplied.]

March 17, 1947

Certificate by Capt. Albert F. Hine, Transportation Corps, at Gulfport, Miss., October 19 through November 4, 1946, November 6 through 26, 1946, and November 8 through December 1, 1946. First report shows 4,600 bags out of 188,832 bags, listed as damaged with first cause "deterioration and partial charring of bags due to ammonium nitrate being bagged hot, contents of some bags remained at a relatively high temperature as long as 48 hours after cars were unloaded and ammonium nitrate placed on wharf" (Jefferds exhibits 19-C, 19-D. and 19-E). (Not printed.)

May 13, 1946

Letter B. T. Christiansen, chief chemist of Emergency Export Corporation, to Dr. John C. Holtz, of the Bureau of Mines, in part stated:

"The tests were made in an effort to determine the factors relevant to the charring of bags. The tests were precipitated because of reports of ammonium nitrate bags arriving at their destination in a charred condition. The reports of charred bags were not investigated and the fact as to whether or not they were actually charred has never been established" (R. vol. 27, p. 22066). [Italics supplied.]

May 19, 1947

Report, Colonel Stribling, commanding officer, Ravenna Arsenal, to Field Director of Ammunition Plants, on trip to port of Baltimore, stated in part: "Throughout the visit it was apparent that personnel handling fertilizer at the port had not been given complete instructions as to the type of material which can be stored with fertilizer, nor are they fully familiar with the problems incidental to proper handling" (R., p. 23092).

June 12, 1947

Confidential circular to branches of the Ordnance Department from Colonel Deitrick, Chief of Safety Division, and executive officer to Commanding Officer of Ordnance. In part it said:

"The Ordnance Department has recognized the explosive properties and capabilities of ammonium nitrate under certain conditions as cited in paragraph 70(a) 1, 70(c) 2, 3, and 4, of the Ordnance Safety Manual, O. O. Form 7224, extracts of which are as follows:

"(c) It (ammonium nitrate) should preferably be stored in explosive type magazines;

(b) When compounded with combustible substances, nitrates are violent fire and explosive hazards and may be subject to spontaneous ignition;

"(c) A fire involving large quantities of ammonium nitrate may result in an explosion. It may be exploded by relatively light initiation, if it has been sensitized by impurities, such as carbonaceous materials.'

2. "The Ordnance Department manufactures and supplies ammonium nitrate with the ideas expressed in paragraph 1 in mind" (R. vol. 33, p. 25130). [Italics supplied.]

July 8, 1947

Report of Picatinny Arsenal on testing FGAN:

"The most significant result included in this summary is the detonation and extensive bomb fragmentation obtained by heating externally fertilizer ammonium nitrate and bagging paper with the air ordinarily present in the bomb removed by evacuation prior to test. ***It is believed that the conditions and results of these tests reflect fairly accurately those of the explosion on board the Grandcamp on April 16, 1947" (O. C. O. 101). (Not printed.)

August 11, 1947

Lieutenant Colonel Gaines, Ordnance Department, memorandum to Field Director of Ammunition Plants states, after careful and exhaustive survey:

"None of the literature published by OF DAP has defended or justified the use of paper bags as containers for fertilizer. If metal containers were used we could eliminate all this confusion over bagging temperatures. Most important of all, we would increase very greatly the safety of handling, shipping, and storage of ammonium nitrate fertilizer. Breakage and spillage at ports and other transfer points would be negligible. It would reduce the amount of combustible material and perhaps many of the numerous recent fires. There are numerous advantages to packaging this fertilizer in metal containers. It is recommended that a study be made to determine the feasibility of using metal containers. So long as countless other items of commercial use and manufacture are packaged in metal containers, it seems on the face of it inexcusable that we continue bagging fertilizer in paper bags" (R. vol. 29, p. 2309). [Italics supplied.]

August 19, 1947

Letter, Col. Merle H. Davis, of Chief of Ordnance Office, to Colonel Dutton, head of Picatinny Arsenal, in part stated:

"General Hughes (Chief of Ordnance) has stated definitely, and we all agree with him on this stand, that the Ordnance Department is not justified in putting $58,000, or any comparable sum, into tests of material which has little or no significance to the Ordnance Department after the completion of the current fertilizer program" (O. C. O. exhibit 20). [Italics supplied.]

July 3, 1947

Again report of Picatinny Arsenal on testing FGAN stated:

"The results of small-scale tests obtained to date are considered to fulfill adequately one of the primary purposes of this investigation by showing that bagged fertilizer ammonium nitrate which is undergoing combustion can be detonated by heat alone, even when the mass is only a few pounds" (O. C. O. exhibit 101). (Not printed.) [Italics supplied.]

December 16, 1947

Aberdeen Proving Ground tests on FGAN contain these conclusions:

"Large quantities of fertilizer grade ammonium nitrate will detonate when exposed to heat or flame in strong and enclosed containers. Large vented quantities, 1 to 2 tons of fertilizer grade ammonium will not detonate when exposed to heat or flame in vented containers. This conclusion may not be valid for quantities greatly in excess of several tons." [Italics supplied.] Under the caption "Recommendations," it is stated:

"Fertilizer grade ammonium nitrate should be stored and transported in compartments which are well vented and will not allow high pressures to build up in the event of a fire" (R. vol. 30, p. 23552).

This same report contained this admission:

"The explosive nature of ammonium nitrate has been known since the First World War" (p. 23554).

2. "The recent disastrous explosions of the steamship Grandcamp and the steamship Highflyer, at Texas City in April 1947, and that of the steamship Ocean Liberty at Brest, in July 1947, however, showed that the substance was not being handled properly" (R. vol. 30, p. 23554). [Italics supplied.]

February

YEAR 1948

Official report, Bureau of Mines, Bulletin RI-4245, contains these admissions: 1. "One longshoreman told the Coast Guard Board of Investigation that he and his coworkers considered the fertilizer compound in a class with cement ***" (p. 21814).

Again: "Some of these longshoremen told the Board that the fertilizer was considered to be the same as any manure fertilizer or in a class with such inert materials as cement ***" (p. 21825).

And again this same report contains this statement:

"From this published material it can be seen that the literature available to the general public and to those persons who normally would be expected to handle the shipping of ammonium nitrate did not indicate an explosion hazard even when the material was involved in a fire" (R. vol. 26, p. 21829). [Italics supplied.]

February 13

Lecture by William H. Rinkenbach on explosibility of ammonium nitrate fertilizer, prepared officially for the Technical Division, Picatinny Arsenal, contains, in part, these statements:

"It is only recently that nearly pure ammonium nitrate as such has been produced and marketed for use as a fertilizer" (vol. 35, p. 26169).

Again: “As stated previously, the interest of the Ordnance Department arose from the fact that the FGAN which exploded has been produced in ordnance plants. It is a regrettable fact that whenever an explosion occurs, the first loud chorus to be heard above the dying echoes of the explosion is what was wrong with the material, and not what was there done that was wrong. *** In the case of the Texas City disaster, the implications were so great that it was possible to apply the manpower required to work out the answers to both questions simultaneously' (R. vol. 35, p. 26172). [Italics supplied.]

On the question of the 16 cases of small arms ammunition as being the originating cause of the detonation, Rinkenbach in his report denies this with this statement:

"This hypothesis of the cause of the cargo explosion, therefore, may be considered very improbable, although not outside range of possibility."

And again: "With the new knowledge of the explosibility of FGAN from heat alone, it will be necessary to approach the problems of its handling, storage, and transportation with a greater awareness of its potential hazard and the necessity for close control of conditions in order to assure safety" (R. vol. 35, p. 26180). April 15

Picatinny Arsenal Serial Report No. 1675:

"16. These intermediate scale tests demonstrate clearly that FGAN can be detonated by heat alone under the proper conditions, and emphasizes the point that it differs from other explosives only with respect to its relative degree of sensitivity. The detonation of a shipload of TNT and picric acid at Halifax in 1917, after catching fire, was very comparable with the explosions on the Grandcamp and Highflyer" (R. vol. 30, p. 23581). [Italics supplied.]

April 20

G. W. Jones, one of the principal technical men at Bureau of Mines, gave a statement to the FBI on behalf of the Government, in part reading:

"It is my opinion that the labeling on the bags of FGAN did not properly reflect the contents of ammonium nitrate" (R. vol. 226, pp. 21885-21886). June

Official Bulletin, Bureau of Mines, 7463, entitled "Ammonium Nitrate" makes these admissions:

"Ammonium nitrate from the point of view of its volatility and on account of many considerations may be regarded as a typical explosives substance."

Again: "It (ammonium nitrate) is an oxidizing agent and as such may react with reducing material such as carbonaceous matter, certain metals, phosphorus, sulfur, etc. Such mixtures may lead to spontaneous heating, and the temperature