The explosions happened on June 21, 1970.
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| TP&W Historical Society posted Fifty-six years ago today on June 21, 1970, eastbound Toledo, Peoria & Western train No. 20 derailed in downtown Crescent City, Illinois. The train had 109 cars, and ten of them were carrying liquid propane, which quickly ignited and led to numerous explosions. Much of the downtown area was destroyed, but miraculously, there were no fatalities. Do you have memories of the Crescent City derailment? Post them in the comments - we'd love to hear from you! Photograph by Leona Smith; courtesy of Matt Smith. Kevin Endres: My dad responded to this call with the F-S-W Fire Protection District. My Cousin's husband who worked at the Tuscola IL plant which last was Llyondel did research on to the distance one of the tank cars went and later determined the the evacuation distance should have been closer to 1 mile. He determined this by the volume of fuel and the weight of the car. Later in the early 80's they had a similar derailment at Murdock, IL and they evacuated 1 mile in all directions. WCIA 3 News was on site within the 1 mile radius and they were moved back. They filmed the explosion and the rail car that ended up almost 1 mile from the derailment. George Wineland was interviewed for a documentary about these incidents. George worked as the safety officer and fire chief of the plant that shipped several flammable commodities including propane out of the Tuscola, IL plant. David Jordan: Per NTSB, there were twelve LPG tank cars together. Nine derailed. Thomas Scoville shared Ted Kappes: My uncle worked for WCIA at the time. One of their reporters was up there and saw a guy with a movie camera. He asked the guy if he got any film of the explosion. The guy said he did and the reporter bought it from him for $5. The film turned out to be very good and was shown all over the country. I imagine that film ended up being worth more than $5. |
My first thought was that the grain elevator blew. But then I saw that the old wood elevator was intact in the photo. And I didn't think a grain elevator could cause an explosion that big. It was caused by the derailment of tank cars carrying propane.
The town recalls the event every five years with a Fireball Festival. But the 50th anniversary festival in 2020 had to be postponed because of COVID-19. "The Fireball Festival is not a the celebration of the disaster, but a celebration of a community’s ability to persevere." [FireballFestival]
Two photos from daily-journal [paycount 5]
15 cars of a 108-car TP&W train derailed. "Among the 15 derailed cars were nine tanker cars, each carrying 34,000 gallons of liquefied propane, a volatile chemical. Another derailed car punctured one of the tankers, thus releasing the propane and igniting a fire." There were no fatalities, but 67 were injured. In total, six tank cars blew up. "McVey recalled witnessing one of the tank cars shooting off like a rocket coming to rest in a house after hitting a huge tree and another home....Another tank car that exploded was found a quarter mile from the wreckage in a cornfield. There were nearly 30 homes destroyed or damaged. Eighteen businesses, including the U.S. Post Office building, were destroyed. The remaining fire was left to burn out, which happened two days later."
(firehouse.com reports it was 16 cars in a 109-car train.)
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Larry Miller III posted five photos with the comment:
Fifty years ago today on June 21, 1970, the town of Crescent City, Illinois was waking up to a relaxing Father's Day. Eastbound TP&W train No. 20 was passing through downtown, and suddenly derailed due to a suspected hotbox. Sixteen cars of the 109-car train derailed in the center of downtown, and ten of those cars were full of liquid propane. A coupler from another freight car punctured one of the tank cars, and the contents ignited instantly.Within minutes, there was a large fire in the center of town and it was growing rapidly. Around 7:30, A. M., the first of several explosions sent a fireball thousands of feet into the air above Crescent City. During the first explosion, firefighters were less than 100 feet away from the tank car.56 hours after the derailment on June 23, the final fire burned out. 70 people had been injured, but amazingly there were no deaths. Most of the downtown area of Crescent City had been completely destroyed, and while the town did rebuild, many lots once occupied by buildings prior to the wreck are now parking lots, giving an eerie reminder of the events on June 21, 1970. Attached are some photos of the wreck by Leona Smith of Woodland, Illinois, courtesy of Matt Smith. You can also find video footage of the wreck here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=292XmN5LUAMPhotos courtesy of the TP&W Historical Society Facebook Group and Thomas Dyrek
Joann R Lambert: My Dad was one of the Firemen who fought the fires and put out what they could. There was a major problem since the train was so long, it blocked both railroad crossings. This made it hard to get firefighting equipment to both sides of the tracks. That is why they have two fire stations in the community. I actually saw the fireballs in the air and even saw the damage afterward. It was devastating to the area. I am glad that so much has come back. It looks nice now. They even have a memorial area by the railroad tracks. There are a lot of pictures and huge rocks that are printed on with information about it.
Ed Beard: As a Fire Fighter, I remember classes being fought on how far to stay away from a derailment fire. They stated that a quarter mile was just right to watch a tank car go over your head.
Trenton Dominy: I went to a Burlington Route historical society meeting in Utica Illinois and mentioned the crescent city derailment and Bleve and a person there said that the defective car was actually on the westbound TP&W train and passed through crescent city when a crew member noticed the smoking car.
They left it on a siding a few miles from crescent city but the crew forgot to inform the dispatcher and when the eastbound train passed by the railcar they picked it up and put it in their train thinking it was for them then finally the car derailed and caused the massive explosion.
David Brann: BLEVE. Boiling Liquid Expanding Vapor Explosion. Puncture a container holding a flammable substance liquid under pressure, provide a source of ignition, and you don't want to be anywhere near it!
Chad Allen Ingold: What fire departments were involved?
Hank Vinson: Chad Allen Ingold , Manteno, Il was one of many , Kankakee city , some twp from Ind , were one of dozens ..
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| 1 Trenton Dominy: How that grain elevator survived a direct hit from both the derailment/fire and explosion and most of it is still standing today is amazing. |
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| 2 Karen Zeedyk-Anglin: Yes that was Father’s Day! That’s when the tank car died up in grandmas yard after the train wreck and explosion. The house was 2 or 3 blocks from the tracks. This was in Crescent City Illinois! |
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| 5 Jon Roma: The explosion in Decatur, IL on July 19, 1974 was yet another incident that caused rethinking of how hazardous material transportation and firefighting evolved during the Seventies. Trenton Dominy: This explosion and another explosion which resulted in several deaths in Kingman Arizona were instrumental in teaching firefighters across the nation about the dangers of flammable liquids and how to safely attack them to extinguish the fires. |
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| Jacob Rajlich commented on Larry's post Perhaps the neatest photo of the explosion came from the air! Incredible that no one was killed. |
The town also has a display about the disaster.
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| firehouse.com |
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| firehouse.com |
Evidently it was the second explosion that caused the most injuries because first responders and reporters had arrived on the scene. After that one, the people learned about the power of a BLEVE (Boling Liquid Expanding Vapor Explosion) and got back. They ended up "thermally treating" the fire. (I love that euphemism for just letting it burn itself out. It ranks up there with "energetic felling" for blowing up a bridge.)
Two of the 18 images collected by Benjamin Light.
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The firehouse.com article confirms that only one tank car was compromised by the derailment. A coupler punctured the car. The other six LPG tank cars were compromised by internal pressure and heat weakened steel. I had noticed when studying tank car safety that the regulations not only addressed collision survivability but duration in a fire. The article indicated that the cars were uninsulated. I wonder if this was the wreck that added tank car safety regulations for surviving a fire as well as the wreck.
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| firehouse.com The 1956 and 1962 IH front-mounted, 500-gpm fire trucks that Crescent City had to fight the fire. They still have them to fight brush fires. They now belong to a fire protection district that has four more trucks bought in 1979, 1981, 1994 and 2004. |
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| Freddie Mac commented on a post | Freddie Mac | I have the Sheldon Fire Truck from that day as a collector item. |
One problem was that the fire fighting activity would soon drain the city's water tower. So they had to get tanker trucks and water, as well as additional pumpers, from other towns. "Ultimately, fire companies from 33 towns (some from as far away as Indiana) appeared with 58 pieces of equipment and 250 firefighters. There were no radio communications between fire departments at the time of the derailment or between fire and police departments. Apparatus did not have radios and no portable communications equipment existed for fire department use. Chanute Air Force Base in Rantoul sent a foam truck. They informed the local firefighters that water would be unable to contain such a fire that included burning propane. An Illinois State Police sergeant in Watseka, about six miles east of Crescent City, was notified of the derailment shortly after it happened and proceeded immediately to the scene. He arrived at approximately 6:45 A.M. and sized up the situation. When he determined that a tank car was being heated by the fire and contained propane, he notified police officers in the area to evacuate the town and warned firefighters to move back to a safer location to fight the fires. His actions may have prevented serious injury and loss of life of firefighters, police officers and civilians when the propane tank cars started exploding." A house and business caught fire from the radiant heat. The town was evacuated for 36 hours. When the derailment happened around 6:30am, the first tank car simply burned. The remaining six tank cars caused BLEVEs at 7:33am, 9:20, 9:30, 9:45, 9:55 and 10:10. "Parts of tank cars were propelled in all directions, setting fires and damaging structures. In all, 10 large pieces of railcars rocketed from 200 feet to 850 feet from the derailment site." The fires for the remaining tank cars were allowed to burn, which took 56 hours. "It was reported that the force of one of the later explosions blew out building fires on Main Street, but as oxygen returned, the fires reignited." The derailment was caused by the overheating of the L-4 journal of the 20th car. Why the journal got too hot was not determined. [firehouse.com]
My speculation about tank car regulations was correct. "After several BLEVEs of this type occurred in the 1970s, the railroad industry retrofitted all tank cars carrying liquefied flammable gases by adding thermal protection, which protects against high temperatures that can weaken metal. Shelf couplers were developed to prevent cars from uncoupling vertically and head shields were fitted to protect against punctures from the couplers. Since these retrofits were completed in 1980, there have been no BLEVEs of railroad tank cars in the United States." Also the training of hazmat teams as to how to properly respond to various types of accidents was initiated. [firehouse.com]
The old wood grain elevator still stands!
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| Street View |
<update>
Jun 2026:
The wood grain elevator was removed when the upgraded the elevator.
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| Street View, Sep 2024 |
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| Google Maps, Apr 2017 |
</update>
The elevator has become a history of steel bins.
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| Street View |
There are some big farms in the area. It takes some significant coin to buy that kind of equipment.
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| Street View |
When I checked out a blue tank that I saw in a satellite image, I discovered that the town has at least one other grain elevator. I recognize CHS as a big agriculture company from their elevator in Superior, WI. Goggle Maps labels this United Prairie, so I don't know who has bought whom. I presume that tank holds liquid fertilizer.
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| Street View |
This elevator is more modern and appears to use just two long buildings for grain storage. (Update: they may be storing dry fertilizer.)
In addition to liquid fertilizer, the town also sells compressed gas fertilizer. Google Maps labels this facility "Propane Refill," but I'll bet most of those tank trailers are used to haul anhydrous ammonia (NH3) to the fields.
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| Street View |
I need to up the priority of doing a field trip down US-24 from the Indiana border to Peoria.
This verifies that the town used to have some 19th Century Italianate architecture.
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| 1:27 video @ 0:19 |
The explosions explain why the downtown now looks like a 1970s strip mall. I think I read that 30 buildings were destroyed.
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| Street View |
I'll bet they were "jumbo" tank cars instead of "jungle." The video mentions that the tank cars were not insulated back then and they were not designed to be strong enough to resist punctures. The fire started because a coupler punctured one of the tank cars. The explosions happen when an intact tank car gets so hot that it ruptures because of the increased gas pressure and all of its liquid content flashes into vapor very quickly. Thus the name Boling Liquid Expanding Vapor Explosion (BLEVE). And those explosions can throw a tank car a big distance like a rocket.
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| 2:31 video @ 1:30 |
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