The Oppau Explosion was a devastating industrial accident that occurred on September 21, 1921,
The Oppau Explosion was a devastating industrial accident that occurred on September 21, 1921, at a BASF fertilizer plant in Oppau, now part of Ludwigshafen, Germany. The explosion involved a storage silo containing a mixture of ammonium sulfate and ammonium nitrate, two commonly used fertilizers. Over time, the stored material had compacted into a rock-like state, and workers were attempting to break it apart using small explosive charges, a method that had been considered safe and had been used over 20,000 times without incident. However, on this fateful day, an explosion of massive proportions was triggered, registering 1.1 on the Richter scale and resulting in a blast crater 90 meters wide and 19 meters deep. The Oppau Explosion was catastrophic in its human and material toll. It killed approximately 560 to 600 people, injured more than 2,000, and left thousands homeless. The shock waves from the blast damaged buildings as far as 30 kilometers away and shattered windows ...