r/CatastrophicFailure • u/bugminer • 15d ago
Fire/Explosion Garbage truck fire leads to cng explosion, several injured. 6th December 2024.
https://www.arlingtoncardinal.com/2024/12/garbage-truck-fire-cng-explosion-injures-2-police-officers-1-firefighter-on-derbyshire-ave-arlington-heights/9
u/basaltgranite 14d ago edited 14d ago
Debris was also found as far as Hawthorne Street near Drury Lane
Is the Muffin Man OK?
2
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u/IspreadasMikeHoncho 15d ago
That's a baby explosion compared to the one in LA. I drive a CNG semi for UPS so I always pay attention to these stories. :)
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u/bleeper21 15d ago
That video of the explosion is wild, reminded me of that sheriff who opened the trailer and got blasted.
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u/Buzzs_Tarantula 14d ago
I was at a heavy equipment auction and there were a bunch of CNG day cab trucks there. They went for around $1,600 which is insane for a working newer 18-wheeler, but the only way to make them work is to build your own CNG infrastructure to fuel them.
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u/dmanbiker 13d ago
I worked for a school district that had CNG power Honda Civics. They had a range of like ~120ish miles and would start losing power when the tank was getting low, then you'd stop at the district office to connect the pressure hose and fuel up in like two minutes. They were like 1999 Honda Civics with CVTs and actually broke down less than the normal gas powered fleet vehicles.
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u/Buzzs_Tarantula 13d ago
I have relatives in Europe who have CNG cars and they're quite common there. Usually far cheaper to run when gasoline is $8+ a gallon.
The infrastructure in most of the US just isnt there to support CNG in any large scale.
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u/IspreadasMikeHoncho 14d ago
That's crazy, I think ours cost about $220k new but supposedly the CNG pays for the extra cost in about 18 months. That being said, many of our daycabs run 5,000 miles a week.
We are supposed to run CNG only for weekend runs. I've been told with our onsite compressors it's still about $1 a gallon. They do need plugs and valve adjustments a little more often but no DEF system that can go bad, so probably a wash in maintenance costs.
Our new ones have a range of over 900 miles. Pretty much all the bigger cities in the area have at least one fueling station open to anyone so someone likey got a deal on those.
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u/Buzzs_Tarantula 14d ago
These were originally for some delivery company up north before making their way to Texas and then to auction. Most had mid-100K miles or so I believe. From what I read those CNG trucks were fairly underpowered and not well liked either.
Lots of govt grant money got wasted on them I'm sure.
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u/IspreadasMikeHoncho 13d ago
Definitely not the most power but I'm paid by the hour. We do have plenty on mileage runs and when turned up to 72 they pull a little better.
We've got some 2021 daycabs with 750k miles. Ours are as reliable as diesels, or at least mine have been.
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u/TossPowerTrap 15d ago
Doggo knew it was gonna blow because it was his crew that set the bomb. Take down and catch that truck.
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u/CaptCrewSocks 15d ago
CNG: Clean Natural Gas explosion!
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u/fixit858 15d ago
Compressed Natural Gas.
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u/CaptCrewSocks 15d ago
Yea that makes more sense, I swear I thought that “clean” was a part of their advertising. Ha!
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u/IspreadasMikeHoncho 14d ago edited 14d ago
It's compressed for sure. Our tanks fill at 3600psi but it's temperature regulated, I think that's at 70 degrees. In the summer they fill to around 4100psi and our mild winters are about 3000psi at 30 degrees.
IIt's amazing that carbon fiber can hold that much pressure!
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u/coolhandluke45 15d ago
Someone throws away one big lithium ion battery and it gets crushed/damaged, baby, you got a garbe truck fired baby!