Ammonium perchlorate was used in the disaster that occurred in what city?
Ammonium perchlorate Ammonium perchlorate ("AP") is an inorganic compound with the formula NHClO. It is a colorless or white solid that is soluble in water. Perchlorate is a powerful oxidizer and ammonium is a good fuel. This combination explains the usefulness of this material as a rocket propellant. Its instability has involved it in a number of accidents, such as the PEPCON disaster.
Ashtabula River railroad disaster The Ashtabula River railroad disaster (also called the Ashtabula horror or the Ashtabula Bridge disaster or the Ashtabula train disaster) was a derailment caused by the failure of a bridge over the Ashtabula River about 1000 ft from the railroad station at Ashtabula, in far northeastern Ohio. On December 29, 1876, at about 7:30 pm, two locomotives hauling 11 railcars of the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway carrying 159 passengers plunged into the river in deep snow when the bridge gave way beneath them. The wooden cars were set alight by their heating stoves, but no attempt was made to extinguish the fire. The accident killed 92 people, including the gospel singer and hymn-writer Philip Bliss and his wife, and was the worst rail accident in the U.S. until the Great Train Wreck of 1918.