Bus caught fire

[Hyronymus]

A Veolia bus on natural gas caught fire today and was completely destroyed: http://regio15.nl/actueel/lijst-weergav ... nburgerweg

The safety vaults on the gas cilinders housed on the roof worked as intended by depressurising at critical pressure rates. An unwanted side effect of this was that the released gas caught fire too, causing the firefighters to wait until all gas had been released from the gas cilinders.

Looking at the interior I don't think modern busses have any fire-delaying materials used for the seats...

[FooBar]

That's quite the significant flamethrower. Imagine what would happen if one of these things goes off in a built-up area. I shall request the municipality to ban these buses from my street.

Interesting how the gas cylinders are oriented. From the thing on the roof I'd guess there would be two cylinders in the other direction.

[Hyronymus]

That's quite the significant flamethrower. Imagine what would happen if one of these things goes off in a built-up area. I shall request the municipality to ban these buses from my street.

Interesting how the gas cylinders are oriented. From the thing on the roof I'd guess there would be two cylinders in the other direction.

They just added new footage. Did anyone say barbeque?


EDIT: I really think the safety of these busses will become a public issue now.

[Geo Ghost]

Good gravy!
If I were on that other bus, I'd be wanting off as quickly as possible.

I feel a bit silly asking, but as I know practically nothing about this area... do those buses run on natural gas? I've honestly never heard of such before.

[Hyronymus]

Good gravy!
If I were on that other bus, I'd be wanting off as quickly as possible.

I feel a bit silly asking, but as I know practically nothing about this area... do those buses run on natural gas? I've honestly never heard of such before.

Yes, see my first post. They run on CNG - Compressed Natural Gas.

[DeletedUser14]

That's quite the significant flamethrower. Imagine what would happen if one of these things goes off in a built-up area. I shall request the municipality to ban these buses from my street.

Interesting how the gas cylinders are oriented. From the thing on the roof I'd guess there would be two cylinders in the other direction.

Shouldn't be an issue for people with the common sense to stay clear of a burning vehicle, let alone a bus. If you don't there may just be a Darwin Award coming your way..

I do think that they may want to think about pointing the safety valves upwards though

[Hyronymus]

As I predicted there is now a discussion about pulling CNG busses of the street until it's clear what caused the fire. Interestingly there also appears to be not a single safety regulation that discusses how CNG busses should be constructed to avoid the spread of fire. As someone replied to a Dutch topic about this: "if this happens to airplanes they are all grounded, with busses we just hope it works out well".

[EXTspotter]

Just reminded me of this:

[Chris]

What do you expect from Arriva?

[Transportman]

So from The Netherlands for the annual Hunger Games: The Bus on fire!

[Illegal_Alien]

Our busses are just fitted with Flamethrowers...

[EXTspotter]

Arriva busses in Guildford are pretty poor. Plus they catch fire occasionally...

[YNM]

We also have some LNG powered busses here, I wonder why the storage is located on the roof ? Because its a lowfloor bus ? At here the bus are highfloor, through. (nearly no real lowfloor bus here)

(LNG : Liquid Natural Gas, I guess its just the same...)

[PikkaBird]

Gas bottles go on the roof because CNG is lighter than air. If it leaks, it goes upwards away from the vehicle, the passengers and the hot engine.

[YukonRob]

We also have some LNG powered busses here, I wonder why the storage is located on the roof ? Because its a lowfloor bus ? At here the bus are highfloor, through. (nearly no real lowfloor bus here)

(LNG : Liquid Natural Gas, I guess its just the same...)

Hopefully you mean LPG (liquified petroleum gas : also known as propane) buses. LNG (liquified natural gas) is not used as a fuel and is very very dangerous. It is CNG (compressed natural gas) that has been cooled to a temp of -160C to form a liquid. If it warms up it expands 600 times and tends to blow things up.

The CNG tanks are aimed to the side because the strongest part of the tank (for the valve) is on the end and they would be too tall otherwise. They are also aimed away from the door so escape is easier when they ignite, which unfortunately means aimed into oncoming traffic.

[audigex]

That's quite the significant flamethrower. Imagine what would happen if one of these things goes off in a built-up area. I shall request the municipality to ban these buses from my street.

Interesting how the gas cylinders are oriented. From the thing on the roof I'd guess there would be two cylinders in the other direction.

Shouldn't be an issue for people with the common sense to stay clear of a burning vehicle, let alone a bus. If you don't there may just be a Darwin Award coming your way..

I do think that they may want to think about pointing the safety valves upwards though

With the valves as they are, that flamethrower could be straight into the window of a child's bedroom - or just any part of someone's house/office. Even pointing up, that's a significant throw of flame, a little wind could blow it sideways into a second or third floor window.

[jor[D]1]

There is going to be an investigation on the safety of CNG busses and the safety valves, due to this accident.

[FooBar]

Hopefully you mean LPG (liquified petroleum gas : also known as propane) buses. LNG (liquified natural gas) is not used as a fuel and is very very dangerous.

They claim to have opened a LNG filling station in the Netherlands about 2 months ago...

[YukonRob]

Thanks for that. I stand corrected. This is cutting edge and a worlds first (http://www.apvgn.pt/documentacao/veicul ... olanda.pdf). I will need to do some research on whether they use the liquid or vapourize it as CNG before utilizing it as fuel.

[FooBar]

According to the document you linked "there is a vaporizer present on the truck". Which makes sense because one has to add air in order for it to ignite.

Interesting stuff though. I wonder if it's economically viable at this point. I don't really want it in my car though. I find LPG and CNG scary enough as it is, I'd be much more comfortable with a stick of C-4 in the trunk.