Responding To Anhydrous Ammonia - KXNet - Bismarck/Minot/Williston/Dickinson

Responding To Anhydrous Ammonia

Firefighters and other rescue workers most likely know the routine when they respond to an injury accident, or a fire.

What they might not know is how to respond to an accident carrying a deadly toxin.

A group called Transcaer teams up with the BNSF Railway,firefighters and other rescue workers to make sure they know how to respond to an accident involving Anhydrous Ammonia.

It looks like your typical train, but what's inside is a product that can be very harmful.

"Anhydrous Ammonia opposes a higher degree of danger for transportation because it's an inhalation hazard, so it's important for the responders to understand the properties and uses of Anhydrous Ammonia," Patrick Brady - Assistant Director of Hazardous Materials For BNSF Railway said.

Patrick Brady is one of the instructors in this training session, showing responders the proper way to deal with this toxic chemical.

"They can run into it in a highway accident involving a transport truck, a derailment involving a tank car in transportation and so it could be a small release, a medium size release," Brady said.

But no matter what the size, it still carries the same danger, and that's something that these students are taking away from the lesson.

"When you see them go up and down the track you don't get a chance to even understand really what they are how they're made up or any of that stuff and going out to the rail yard and getting a hands on and seeing the locomotives and seeing the cars and how they're put together where the valves are how to shut them off is going to be very beneficial to us," Mandan City Fire Department Captain, Wayne Friesz said.

Training that these students hope they won't ever need to use, but if they do, they'll be ready.

Anhydrous Ammonia is a chemical found in a lot of household cleaning products as well as fertilizers.

Transcaer will be in Jamestown on Friday to give responders the same training.