Comments by "Dr Gamma D" (@DrDeuteron) on "CCTV captures moment tanker truck explodes in Italy" video.

  1. That was a hot boiling liquid expanding vapor explosion (BLEVE).Not too common, but more violent than a bucket of flammable Hollywood liquid.Both are low order: subsonic detonation, so the explosive is dispersing as it explodes. Military explosions (and Beirut) are high order: supersonic detonation front means kilo tons of cold solid instantly (on mechanical time scales) turn into several species of very hot gasses with no time to expand, under millions of pounds of pressure: now they need to expand supersonically: very, very destructive.
    1
  2. Hot BLEVE
    1