April Fool Reporting in Atlanta

[Gary '79 5C]

Saw this on a diesel MB board and had to share the misreportings and misconceptions of this wonderful world we live in today.

http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/clayton/stories/2009/03/31/diesel_wrecker_service.html?cxntlid=homepage_tab_newstab

No disrespect to the many great people in and around Atlanta...

Gary

[Paladin]

Umm, I gotta go buy some jerry cans now and start pumping. I bought when prices dropped just in case.

Is it really that dangerous?

[gumpy]

Umm, I gotta go buy some jerry cans now and start pumping. I bought when prices dropped just in case.

Is it really that dangerous?

Of course it's that dangerous! Didn't you read the article! It could have blown up 14 houses! We should ban all forms of storage of diesel fuel. We should restrict all diesel vehicles and not let them within 20 miles of any building! Send them all the to desert so they can't hurt anyone! OMG! I can't believe this guy had the nerve to even handle the fuel! What if it had eaten through his space suit and gotten on his skin? Then what? He'd have run down the street contaminating the whole neighborhood. What if he'd dropped that cigarette on the ground? It might have set off those two storage tanks and blown up those 14 houses.

Wonder what made the storage illegal. Sounds like it was in proper containers.

By the way.... how far away would you have to get from the blast to take out 14 houses? 

Oh, and what kind of cigarette was it that could ignite diesel?  Last time I dropped a lit cigarette into a bucket of diesel, it just went out.  And the last time I dropped a lit cigarette onto a concrete floor under a non-leaking tank of diesel, it just laid there and smoked till it burned itself out.

Well, what do you expect. People are becoming government sheep. They can no longer think for themselves. Especially in Clayton County. This is the same county that laid off something like 120 people in their school district, but spent over $75000 to buy uniforms for their bus drivers to prevent the buses from being hijacked!!?!

[cody]

We have hundreds of homes in this area with 250 gallon fuel oil tanks in their basements, and (horrors) connected to furnaces, these foolish people are thinking they are heating their homes with it, I wonder if their neighbors know. lol I'll even bet that if the authorities looked closely they would find a flame source very close to the furnace, possibly even in it, oh the humanity of it all.

[Gary '79 5C]

In the NorthEast portion of the country it is very common that homes are heated with #2 fuel oil heaters. Many also have the 250 or 500 gal tanks located in the basement, when the homes are very close together. Others have the tank located right adjacent to the home, others have the tank buried. I exumed (2) 250 gal tanks when I demo-ed my home to rebuild. I did not want the leak potential ( and EPA problems ) of the 25 year old tanks, with high level brackish ground water.

Like everything else, there are hazards, but not to the extreme as painted in the report by the officials, That is what is baffling to me.

[belfert]

What a bunch of fools.  Diesel is hardly explosive and a cigarette would have a heck of a time igniting it.  There are jet mechanics who put out cigarettes in jet fuel.

The power company used to do fire extinguisher demos for my summer job years ago.  They used a pool of diesel and then poured gasoline on top as the diesel wouldn't ignite.

[Paladin]

Uh, by the way, I'm still in April Fools mode. There is no way I'd store fuel like that even though the ignition point of diesel is low. I hardly keep extra gas for the mower. I remember seeing a scary movie as a kid about kids getting burned by gas.