Posted on 02/09/2011 2:54:05 AM PST by crosslink
Edited on 02/09/2011 6:51:12 AM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
Several sources familiar with the ongoing investigation tell WTOP fire and police investigators believe the radiator in Turton's 2008 BMW X5 was punctured when it rolled into a workbench. The halogen headlights, which emit a bluish light and illuminate the road better than conventional headlights, stayed on after the radiator was punctured.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Keyless ignition gives us the answer to the question of how it is she was in the driver's seat with the garage doors still closed.
The answer is she didn't intend to start the car ~ but that happened anyway.
Yes, if the antifreeze is very hot it will spray, and if it is hot, water will evaporate until the mixture reaches an azeotrope point (which is where you want your water-glycol mix to be, to get the lowest freeze point and highest boil point).
It should not distill out completely, though. But I’ve read that a water-glycol mist can burn in some circumstances.
I’m just gonna have to take my garden sprayer and do some experiments with my Bernz-O-Matic.
Things like gasoline have a very strong smell and the propane we buy as well as natural gas has a chemical added to it to make it smell real bad to allow people to know when it is leaking.
Antifreeze does not. Dogs will lick pools of it and make themselves sick. Some say it smells sweet, like maple syrup.
People use it poison others because it does not taste that bad.
I could see her entering the garage in the morning and not smelling anything that “smelled” explosive and not being alerted to any danger.
“Off topic but why are spouses of lobbyists allowed to be on any President’s staff?”
Agreed. That should be asked of Congress too. It is a conflict just like the wife of the prosecutor or defending attorney serving on a jury. It is bad policy for America and why isn’t it prohibited?
http://privateinvesigations.blogspot.com/2011/01/wife-of-white-house-advisor-dan-turton.html
What was the ignition source? Why was she unconscious? Toxicology and autopsy results? Motive? Spark from headlights ignited existing fumes in garage from a leaking gasoline or other inflammable container? And it takes weeks to get post-mortem forensic toxicology results.
This shoe has yet to fall. One of the more knowledgeable posters here said it is not uncommon for it to take 4 to 6 weeks to get results back on a full battery of toxicology tests.
It's been 4 weeks so far. Police not commenting. Fire investigators not commenting. BATFE not commenting. No cause of death announced.
I believe that was some sort of BMW SUV. Nearly all have oil coolers either built in or in front of the engine cooling radiator. Trans fluid and oil are both obviously flammable.
Still, why/how she diddn't have time to get out of the car, is suspicious.
She got in the car; stuff combusted; it killed her and started a fire in the garage.
Two different events ~ coming home and puncturing the radiator, and then in the early morning hours getting in the car to go to the airport.
It’s not at all unusual to walk through a parking lot and smell antifreeze spilling out of vehicles through the overflow tube. Ain’t nothing new here!
The pure cellulose in the mixture gives you a whole 'nuther look at gunpowder.
Tip, don't try to compress it into grains ~ just leave it alone. And, STAND BACK ~ way back!
That's mostly why Agar Agar is sold in blocks and such ~ as a powder it is INCREDIBLY dangerous.
This is the piece that is still not sitting well with me. I can't find any evidence that vapors from e-glychol are volatile enough to explode like gasoline vapors. Burn yes, explode? - hmmmmm
Someone who looked nothing like me once took two buckets and two foil pie tins and put an inch of gas in one tin and and inch of undiluted e-glychol in the other and duct taped a bucket over each pie tin with the end of a 10 foot length on cannon fuse poking up on the inside of each of the buckets and let both sit overnight.
As luck would have it, the next morning some unrestrained youth lit both fuses.
Gas? Big boom - need a new bucket.
E-glychol? Nothing - nada - squat
Of course, I would never be stupid enough to replicate this experiment.
That is even more weird. For that bulb to cause fluid to burn it would need to be hot. It doesn’t happen instantaneously. Even then, it’s highly improbable the result would be an explosion.
A bit more research indicates that while methanol was used in the early 1900s as an engine coolant, that practice was discontinued years ago because methanol is so volatile.
Reading the label on Prestone II e-glychol (yellow jug) confirms no methanol.
Same with Peak in the blue jug.
And boy, I can't detect any smell in either.
OK - I now have my tin foil hat completely screwed on.
They believe the victim was “stricken and unconscious” before the fire started, yet there were no signs trauma, leading the first responders to suspect an “unknown medical condition”.
If you wanted to cover up a perfect murder...
Sneak into the garage some time during the night. Puncture the radiator, letting the coolant pool under the vehicle.
Ambush the victim with a hypo of succinylcholine. Gently place victim in front seat, start car. Open garage door, back part of the way out. Put car in park. Walk to the front of the car. Touch your zippo to the pool of coolant. Disappear down the alley to the rear.
With burns on the body, can't find a needle mark. No blunt force trauma. No “unnatural accelerants” found at the scene. Fast and hot burn. No explosions. Why open the door and move the car part of the way out? Because for a fast and hot burn you need a lot of oxygen. If the door were closed, the fire would burn more slowly and have less of a chance of destroying the evidence.
Just say’in.
“Touch your zippo to the pool of coolant.”
It will ignite- if the pool is first heated to above the flash point, which for pure ethylene glycol is 240F.
You can wave a flame over it all day and it won’t go. And mixed with water? Never.
There are chafing dish heaters that use a glycol instead of the methanol-based Sterno, and even with a wick, they are difficult to light.
Yep. Just tried it. Both Peak and Prestone (e-glychol), undiluted.
Nothing.
I even poured some denatured alcohol in the middle and lit it.
A little of the glycol burnt off, but even that was not enough for a sustaining fire.
Do you know if the newer p-glycol more flammable? I don't have any of that to play with.
Both ethylene and propylene will burn with the proper wick, I’ve done it, to see if a jug of antifreeze can be used as emergency fuel/heat/light.
Yep, it’s less flammable than lamp oil but in a pinch will work handily.
A wick......GENIUS!!!
I went down to the outside lab again and this time I set two or three newspapers (commonly found in a garage) on top of a pool of glycol and touched my “zippo” to the newspaper. Had me one heck of a glycol fire, and quick too. And this was at an ambient temperature of 18 degrees.
This was 100% e-glycol, however - not diluted
Where DID my tin foil hat go.......
You gotta’ dry it up a bit - take a good look at the chemistry.
On the other hand the electric heating coil in the catalytic converter heats prett quick.
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