TOO MUCH TNT

Southland Times, Issue 18077, 2 May 1919, Page 6

TOO MUCH TNT

PROBLEM FOR AMERICA, TRYING TO FIND USE FOR BIG STORES OF EXPLOSIVES, The 200,000,0001bs of TNT that the United States Government possessed when the armistice was signed has provided a problem for the Government which is at a loss to know how to dispose of it. Whenever a town discovers that any large quantity of the explosive is stored nearby, an agitation is started for its removal and the dangerous material is removed to some other spot. The Government has given orders for the creation of ammunition reserves but it is estimated that at most 70,000,0001bs will be utilised in this way. According to experts of the big du Pont company who furnished the unofficial estimate of the total supply in the country, there are two methods of disposing of TNT other than using it as a high explosive. One, as has been said, is to throw it into the ocean; the other is to boil St away—the first plan being the least expensive. There is no known method of breaking up the stuff into its original chemical elements. Use of it in the formation of new chemical compounds is still altogether in the experimental stage. G. Carlton Smith, 8.5., instructor in general chemistry in the school of applied science at the Carnegie Institute of Technology in Chicago, one of the leading authorities pn the explosive, states' that there are many known chemical reactions for the six different forms of TNT. He believes that, while many of them are little better than theoretical, some may form a basis for of trinitrotoluene. It is the hope of the chemists at work on the problem at Washington and elsewhere throughout the United States to develop some means of utilising TNT either as a base for dyes or for fertilisers. The three best known forms of the explosive, which constitute virtually 100 per cent of the production, all react with aniline. But many of tlie resultant compounds are unstable and a commercial use has yet to be found for others. Concerning the decomposition of TNT by heating Dr Smith said; “Verola found, whole conducting experiments to determine the vapor tension of TNT, that, beginning at 160 degrees C., a steady evolution of gas took place. He therefore investigated the behaviour of the substance at varying temperatures, measuring the gas evolved. The quantity employed by Verola was five grains. The temperatures investigated were 160, 180, 201 and 217.5. At 160 the TNT decomposed very slowly, and a very slight volume of gas was given off. At 180 the decomposition increased, 8 cubic mm. of gas resulting. The quantity of gas increased steadily until at 217.5 the volume of gas was 200 cubic mm. a minute. Upon heating the TNT still higher, it was found that very ’ rapid'decomposition took place at 281 to 286 degrees. . . From these figures it is evident that TNT is quite stable at temperatures below 130 degrees C. The decomposition begins at 150, being very slight at this temperature, until at 281 the decomposition takes place with explosive. violence.”

The same authority, in a summarised description of the explosive, says: “Trinitrotoluene is just what its name implies—a triple nitrated toluence. Toluene itself is a liquid prepared usually from coal tar by distillation. This is the main source of this substance in North America, although it is prepared in smaller amounts from artificial gas, the cracking of crude petroleum, etc. Trinitrotulcne belongs to the shattering class of explosives known as the “brisante.’ The members of this class possess great force and upon exploding shatter the containing shell into small pieces, thus doing more damage than a shell. The other well known member of the brisant class of explosives is picric' acid, or trinitrophenol. Previous to the use of trinitrotoluene, picric acid was used largely as the explosive charge in shells. There are several disadvantages in picric acid, however, which trinitrotoluene does not have. Picric acid forms salts (picrates) with a great number of the metals. These plcrateg are very unstable, and are quite sensitive to shock, thus giving rise to premature explosions, which often result fatally. TN is very inactive toward the greater number of the metals; Furthermore, picric acid has a high melting point, 122.5 degrees, while the melting point of TNT is low enough that it may be poured into the shell in the molten state without danger from fire.” Most of the plants that produced large quantities of TNT for the American Government, after the armistice started converting their facilities into the manufacture of dyes. The increase in production of this explosive was one of the biggest developments qf the war. Shortly after America declared that a state of war existed with Germany the ordnance department made a survey of the countiy's available TNT plants and found that, combined, their output was about 108,000,0001bs: a year. How that was increased was shown by the stock at the end of the fighting. It is shown also by the statement that the du Pont organisation produced in all about 130,000,0001bs of the explosive up to the signing of the armistice. Huge increases in output also were made by such firms as the Hercules and Aetna companies, the Semct-Solvay company and its allied concerns, and hundreds of small plants that sprang up all over the country, TNT is melted for loading into shells and poured from large cans (stated a writer in the New York Tribune). Nearly every plant equips its boiling apparatus with temperature gauges to prevent heating over 100 degrees. The stuff reaches the loading plants in the form pf small crystals resembling brown sugar. Profiting by expensive explosions and some of the tricks at which the German agents were caught red-handed, the loading plants adopted the plan of filling boiling tanks through screens. In less than five months of operation at the Atlantic loading plant 40 men were arrested and most of them imprisoned as German agents. Three of these were casght in the act of throwing steel shavings or bits of iron, calculated to cause detonation by contact with the mixing apparatus, into the boiling tanks. One man who performed this operation on 50 gallons of the explosive and who didn’t know he had been observed, was so anxious to prevent discovery that he spent ten minutes sauntering toward the exit, although, as far as he knew, the plant might have gone up at any moment.