Hydrogen Cyanide (Hydrocyanic Acid) "Candy Cane" Tank Cars

[stefano1]

made a quick research on "Candy Cane" Hydrogen Cyanide tank cars, mentioned in  Sunday Photo Fun 18, January 2015

these are some examples
SHPX + ACFX 19195 - ? insulated 10,670 gallon 70t ICC 105-A-300-W blt in 1966 - ?
here in 1973 ACFX19223

ACFX 77256 – 77280 insulated 20,522 gallon 100t DOT 105-A-300-W blt in 1986
here in 1987 ACFX77267
and still around in 2013 ACFX77277  

[kcjones]

Stefano,
Bingo!! You found it!! The 70t tank is the one I remember seeing coming into Mays yard back in the early 80's. I didn't know that they had built a larger version. That 20k tank would be right up Bobby's ally with that side catwalk. That huge red placard really makes the car stand out.
Ohhhh Bobby......
JL

And they're worried about a couple of little ol' tank cars of crude oil....

[tankcarsrule]

That car would make a great project, that's for sure! I've started another tank car that's very unusual, I hope to post progress photos soon.

Regards, Bobby

[curtmc]

I've seen several of those cars in the past, most recently at Buckeye yard near Columbus, and Conway yard NW of Pittsburgh.

Whereas HCN is some very nasty stuff it is shipped in very well protected tanks (inner and outer steel tanks of 1"+ thickness separated by a liner layer) and if there is a leak or spill (extremely rare) I have read that it has one advantage over fighting a chlorine leak... it rapidly burns (and when it burns it leaves no hazardous vapors or residue). So a well trained response team has a way to get an incident under control.