 Excerpt
From the NTSB's Executive Summary:
About
5:14 a.m., eastern daylight time, on June 29, 1998, at Stock Island,
Key West, Florida, a Dion Oil Company (Dion) driver was on top of a
straight-truck cargo tank checking the contents of its compartments
and preparing to transfer cargo from a semitrailer cargo tank when explosive
vapors ignited within the straight-truck cargo tank. The ignition caused
an explosion that threw the driver from the top of the truck. The fire
and a series of at least three explosions injured the driver and destroyed
the straight truck, a tractor, the front of the semitrailer, and a second
nearby straight-truck cargo tank. Damage was estimated at more than
$185,000. As a result of its investigation of the accident, the National
Transportation Safety Board identified three major safety issues:
The adequacy of Dion’s product-transfer procedures and training.
The adequacy of the Federal Highway Administration’s oversight of motor
carriers’ procedures and training for loading and unloading hazardous
materials.
The adequacy of Florida’s oversight of the fire safety of storage tanks.
The
Safety Board determines that the probable cause of the accident was
Dion’s lack of adequate procedures and driver training, resulting in
the driver’s pouring a mixture of gasoline and diesel fuel from a plastic
bucket into a cargo-tank compartment that contained a mixture of explosive
vapors.
As a result of its investigation of this accident, the Safety Board
makes
recommendations to the Federal Highway Administration, Dion, the Florida
State Fire
Marshal, the Florida Department of Transportation, the Florida Department
of
Agriculture, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, the
National Fire
Prevention Association, the National Association of State Fire Marshals,
and the
International Association of Fire Chiefs
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