Engineering FailureAnalysis, Vol 3, No. 2, pp.

115-127, 1996
Pergamon Copyright 1996Elsevier ScienceLtd
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C L A S S I C B R I T T L E F A I L U R E S IN L A R G E W E L D E D S T R U C T U R E S

B. HAYES
TWI, Abington Hall, Abington, Cambridge C B I 6AL, U . K .

(Received 25 November 1995)

Abstract--It is useful to reflect occasionally on the engineering past, particularly in order to understand
how we got to our present state of knowledge, but also to avoid history repeating itself. A s the control
of brittle fracture has become increasingly effective, it is important to be aware that the underlying
problem has not gone away. H e n c e this paper reviews, in what is intended to be an accessible way,
classic cases of catastrophic brittle fracture in large welded structures so that those not in the field of
structural integrity can appreciate the p h e n o m e n o n of brittle fracture and some of its causes. Copyright
1996 Elsevier Science Ltd.

1. HASSELT BRIDGE

The Hasselt Bridge [1-6] over the Albert Canal in Hasselt, Belgium collapsed at about
8.20 a.m. on 14 March 1938. Witnesses saw a crack open in a lower chord of the bridge
(between the third and fourth verticals), accompanied by a loud report. This failure of the
lower chord transferred the load to the upper chord and six minutes later the bridge fell into
the canal in three sections, taking with it a tramcar and a number of pedestrians. All of the
people on the bridge survived. Part of the collapsed bridge is shown in Fig. 1.
The Hasselt bridge was one of approximately fifty Vierendeel truss bridges (named after a
Professor Vierendeel) built across the Albert Canal. As shown in Fig. 2(a), the bridge
consisted of straight lower chords, supporting the deck, and two parallel curved upper chords.
The upper and lower chords were connected by vertical girders, the bridge having no diagonal
members. The bridge, of span 75 m, was designed to carry road and light railway traffic. It
was erected between 1935 and 1936 and commissioned in January 1937. The structure was
all-welded, the upper and lower chords being box girders made from welded plate I-beams
with dimensions as shown in Fig. 2(b). The steel was a Belgium St-42 grade non-killed
Bessemer steel with specified tensile strength between 365 and 435 N mm -2, in the as-rolled
condition.
The collapse of the Hasselt bridge was the first major failure of an all-welded structure and
it was the subject of great interest and several investigations, not all of which reached the
same conclusions. All the fractures in the bridge, through both parent plate and welds, were
brittle. Some of the fractures were thought to have occurred as a result of the impact of the
fall.
Analysis of the steel found it to be of expected chemical composition, albeit with rather
high sulphur and phosphorus contents. The results of chemical analysis of samples from the
bridge [6] are given in Table 1. Tensile test results were acceptable but the room temperature
notch toughness measured by Izod impact tests was low for some of the steel samples. The
temperature at the time of the failure of the bridge was about - 2 0 C.
The fractures in the lower chord, which was the first part of the structure to fail, were
associated with connections to verticals. Given the design of the bridge, the loading in the
lower chord was essentially tensile. Fracture initiation is thought to have occurred in the weld
joining the flanges of a vertical to those of the lower chord girder as shown in Fig. 3.
Examination of a similar weld from another location in the bridge [6] showed complete lack
of fusion at the root. The geometry of the joint did not allow a sealing run to be made to the
root. Residual stress levels measured in similar undamaged joints were found to be very
significant.
115
 116 B. HAYES

Fig. 1. Part of Hasselt Bridge which collapsed in March 1938.

The combination of low parent material toughness at the ambient temperature, high stress
concentrations at the weld resulting from poor joint design and welding procedures, the
inherent rigidity of the bridge and the presence of defects and residual stresses led to failure
of the lower chord and subsequent collapse of the bridge.
In January 1940, two other Vierdendeel truss bridges over the Albert Canal failed but did
not collapse [1, 4]. In the first at Herenthals-Oolen, failure initiated in the lower flange of the
lower chord at the joint to a wind brace. At the time the bridge was unloaded and the
ambient temperature was - 1 4 C. The bridge was subsequently blown up during the German
invasion of Belgium. The second bridge was at Kaulille and was built of rolled I-beams rather
than plate girders. Cracking occurred in the lower chord and was not associated with any
welds. This factors pointed to the importance of using steels with adequate notch toughness
regardless of the possibility of welding defects or not.

2. T2 T A N K E R S C H E N E C T A D Y

If the collapse of the Hasselt Bridge shook the welding industry, the failures of all-welded
ships in the early 1940s stimulated intense research into the nature and causes of brittle
fracture. The huge World War II emergency ship building programme for the U.S.A. and
Great Britain relied on welding. In the U.S.A. nearly 5000 merchant ships were built for the
 Classic brittle failures in large welded structures 117
F..IV E.IV
Ell'. t '~ E.II~

o.79/I E.;;~ Ei;/ EIC E.I;" ,

t.._ _. "7.1-~2 . . . . t .0.79
E.I|~ . . Ercclton ;;bl,l.,
II . . . F r n c l . r ~iill" S i d e
PLAN ON A-B ~ ... ~r

_ _T _ I ! o.~,
i
i I I I I I I---
............... q- r

a)

~' I 1 I I I t I

UPPER CHORD I LOWER CHORD, J

~

I
. . . . 1 0 5 0 . . . . . . -

'
- -

l_ ~.7~
a,-~

_~- ~ ~_ . . . . . ~ . ~ =/..~e~---
1 7.'lq~x~lOOx I~ 4F~-~-

20 20

. . . . . "I50 ........ ~.

!
%-,- l,,-I

"%--~r.,9 t . , o . , ./.~ "7

...... 750 . . . . . . .-~ ;

~/'//'Z/II/~I//I/.~ !-------4 ~ / / / ~ .
l.-,~
?,'10 X21~' x 7,q
~.~ ~ I

I ~//././~ ~)Fzt , f , / / / ~ / / / ; ~ l" ~ -

(s4tl.c. "~gOx'20 "~N~mI~EII1NI'~

b)
VERTICAL
~. ,~oo [- 3 O O - - q

I
I
' r. I00 e I
-,'1 t'' t" """' i"- ~ l
?.
. [..tl ,,
I
I
K%N~N .. k'x\\\~ x\\\~l. __.t _
...... 750 ........

Fig. 2. Details of Hasselt Bridge: (a) overall plan showing location of fractures, (b) dimensions of bridge
members.
118 B. H A Y E S

Table 1. Chemical composition of Hasselt Bridge parent steel [6]

Analysis

Sample C Mn Si S P

I 0.125 0.44 0.008 0.046 0.036

2 0.139 0.52 0.034 0.034 0.049
3 0.20 0.49 tr. 0.064 0.054
4 (casting) 0.17 1.02 - 0.095 0.084
5 0.13 (/.54 0.029 0.06l
~ 0.14 1.(17 tr. 0.063 0.063
7 0.15 (I.55 t1.(ti(I 0.052 0.060

F_ ag__J---~

d
O- --

I'
,/
/
/
/
l
Y
Fig. 3. Primary fracture at attachment of vertical member to lower chord in Hasselt Bridge.

Maritime Commission between 1941 and 1946. Of these, 2580 were Liberty ships and 530
were T2 tankers.
At 11 p.m. on the 16 January 1943, a few days after completing sea trails, the 152 m long
T2 tanker Schenectady broke in two amidships while lying at the outfitting dock in the Kaiser
Company yard in Portland, Oregon, U.S.A. [7-9]. The temperature of the harbour water was
about 4 C and the conditions were still. The air temperature was approximately - 3 C and
the winds were light.
The failure was sudden and accompanied by a report that was heard a mile away. The
fracture extended through the deck, the sides of the hull, the longitudinal bulkheads and the
bottom girders. The vessel jack-knifed (see Fig. 4), hinging on the bottom plate which had
remained intact. The central part of the ship rose clear of the water so no flooding of the hull
through the fracture occurred.
Although fractures in the emergency programme ships had been reported, the Schenectady
was the first catastrophic failure, made all the more impressive by the still conditions under
which it occurred. Then, in March 1943, a sister ship to the Schenectady, the Esso
Manhattan, broke in two at the entrance to New York harbour in sea conditions described as
very moderate. The U.S. Coast Guard, which was responsible for the safety of merchant
vessels, requested the setting up of a Board of Investigation into the design and construction
of welded ships. The Board was set up in April 1943 and co-ordinated a major research effort
into the fracture of ships.
 Classic brittle failuresin large weldedstructures 119

Fig. 4. T2 tanker Schenectadyafter failurein January 1943.

The failure of the Schenectady initiated on the deck between two bulkheads. A defective
weld was presented in a region of stress concentration due to a design detail. The nominal
tensile stress in the deck was calculated to be 68 N mm -2. Poor welding procedures were cited
by the committee investigating the failure as contributory: however, at the time, the problems
were not fully understood.
The importance of weld quality was dramatically illustrated by the experience of the T2
tankers in which 50% of the fractures initiated in welds were not associated with design
discontinuities. The investigation into the Schenectady also questioned the adequacy of steel
specifications for all-welded ship hulls. The steel used to build the Schenectady was of a
quality which was known to be acceptable for riveted ships.
The final Report of the Board of Investigation was published in 1946 [9]. It considered 4694
welded steel merchant ships built in the emergency ship building programme, of which 970
sustained fractures. The report concluded that the fractures were due to the presence of
notches in steels which were notch sensitive at the operating temperature and that the
specifications current at the time were "not sufficiently selective to exclude" such steels.
Research into ship failures continued with the Charpy V notch properties of casualty ship
plates being investigated. The absorbed energy in the Charpy V notch test, one of the few
standardized fracture tests then available, was found to correlate well with the observed crack
initiation, propagation and arrest behaviour of the ship steels. By the early 1950s the 15 ft lb
or 20 J Charpy transition temperature was being used as a reference as it appeared to define
the highest temperature at which brittle fracture initiation would occur in ship quality steels.
However, research showed that the critical temperature for brittle fracture initiation cor-
responded to higher Charpy energy values when modifications to alloying elements, grain
size, deoxidation methods and normalizing heat treatments were made. Hence, the approach
to brittle fracture avoidance could not be based on a simple fixed reference Charpy energy
level [10].
120 B. HAYES
3. F A W L E Y C R U D E OIL S T O R A G E T A N K

In the early 1950s the lessons learnt in the ship building industry regarding brittle fracture
had not yet been incorporated into storage tank construction practice. The steels used for
storage tanks did not have to meet notch toughness requirements.
On 12 February 1952 a large all-welded oil-storage tank collapsed during hydrotest at the
Esso Petroleum plant at Fawley in Hampshire [11-13]. Hydrotesting had been commenced on
30 January following completion of the tank, but was halted when a 0.6 m long vertical crack
appeared in the bottom two strakes. The tank, which was approximately two-thirds full when
the cracking occurred, was emptied and the crack repaired. When the hydrotest was
recommenced on 11 February, the air temperature was near freezing and the water
temperature +4 C. The tank split when the water had reached 90% of the tank height, a
continuous vertical fracture running through the parent plate of every strake. The shell was
torn from the tank bottom and collapsed on the surrounding bund, leaving the roof lying on
the base (see Fig. 5).
The cylindrical tank was 42 m in diameter and 16 m high. The bottom was conical with a
0.6 m fall at the centre and the roof was a detached fully floating pontoon. The tank shell
consisted of nine strakes made from butt welded plates measuring 1.8 m x 7.2 m. The strakes
were progressively thinner from bottom to top, being aligned to produce a flush internal
surface. The bottom strake was 28 mm thick and the top was 6 mm.
The construction of the tank was API Code 12C. The material used was a BS 13 steel with
specified tensile strength in the range 430 to 510 MPa, equivalent to ASTM A7 or A283 steel.
The chemical composition of the plate adjacent to the primary fracture in the bottom course
is given in Table 2.
The shell welds were full penetration double or single V welds, depending on the plate
thickness. Plate edge preparation for welding was carried out prior to rolling the plates to the
required radius. No preheating was used except to dry the plates or remove frost. Boat
shaped samples were cut from the welds of the lower courses for inspection, leaving grooves
that were repair welded. All boat samples, except one, were satisfactory.

Fig. 5. Crude oil storage tank at Fawley after collapse in February 1953 (the tank seen in the
background failed the following month).
 Classic brittle failuresin large weldedstructures 121
Table 2. Chemicalcompositionof bottom course plate adjacentto fracture in Fawleycrude oil storage tank [11]
Element C Si Mn P S Ni Cr Cu As N
0.165 0.015 0.54 0.024 0.036 0.086 0.02 0.13 0.03 0.1

The 0.6 m long crack which occurred during initial hydrotesting originated from a repaired
boat-sample site. The brittle crack which caused the collapse of the tank also initiated at a
repaired boat-sample position in the circumferential weld between the lower two strakes. A
very small cavity had been left at the bottom of the boat-sample groove when it was repaired.
This defect was found to be much smaller than others detected in the shell welds after the
failure.
The weld quality was in fact quite variable, although this had not been revealed by the
inspection during fabrication. Tests on the plate material showed it to meet the specification:
however, its Charpy impact transition temperature was in the approximate range 0 C to
15 C. Therefore the tank material did not have good toughness at the hydrotest temperature.
The existence of defects which were significantly longer than the one from which the
fracture initiated perturbed the investigators. As no evidence of shock or impact loading
which could have triggered the collapse was found, the investigation into the failure did not
reach a conclusion regarding the cause of the fracture initiation.
Approximately one month after the failure of the crude oil tank, a neighbouring gas oil
tank failed during hydrotest. This tank split vertically but remained in one piece. The tank
was 45.7 m in diameter and 14.6 m high, built, like the crude oil tank, of BS 13 steel to API
12C. The water temperature was +4 C and the air temperature +9 C at the time of failure.
Examination of the fracture faces revealed that the failure initiated at a partially repaired
crack in a vertical weld in the bottom shell course. The surfaces of the crack were blackened,
indicating that the crack had gone through a heating cycle due to a nearby welding operation.
Subsequent studies indicated that the probable cause of the failures was the presence of
very low toughness material in the region of the initiating defects. These regions of low
toughness would have resulted from dynamic strain-ageing embrittlement during repair
welding (or subsequent heat cycling) [14, 15]. This type of strain ageing embrittlement, which
is intensified at crack tips, is a potential problem associated with repair welds, particularly in
coarse grained non-aluminium treated steels.
These failures raised concern over the weld inspection method specified in the API Code
which relied on taking boat samples from the welds [16]. In the case of the crude oil tank, the
failure initiated from a poorly repaired boat-sample site and in the case of the gas oil tank a
significant defect was missed by the inspection method. These concerns led towards the use of
radiography for weld inspection in storage tanks.
The failures also highlighted the importance of material toughness for storage tanks and the
introduction of the use of materials with minimum Charpy V properties greatly improved the
safety of these structures.

4. W O R L D CONCORD

The early research into ship failures led to changes in both design and materials
specifications. The elimination of notch effects was of primary concern, steel toughness
requirements were raised and riveted crack arrestors were called for [17]. The effect of these
changes was a significant reduction in the number of ships to suffer major failures: however,
losses still occurred.
The World Concord was the largest tanker in the world at the time of its failure [18, 19]. It
had been built in 1952 by Vickers Armstrong Ltd in Barrow-in-Furness to an up-to-date
design. It was a single deck, all-welded, single screw steam turbine oil tanker 199 m long with
a registered tonnage of 11,700 tonnes. The vessel framing consisted of longitudinals approxi-
mately 0.8 m apart and transverse webs positioned about 3 m apart. Transverse bulkheads
were located every 12 m along the vessel's length. There were ten cargo tanks each with
starboard, centre and port compartments.
122 B. H A Y E S

On the afternoon of 26 November 1954 the World Concord left the Mersey and set off
southward down the Irish Channel. The vessel was in "Winter Ballast Departure Condition",
as recommended by the builders, carrying about 18,000 tonnes water ballast. In the evening,
following warnings of severe south-westerly gales, the master took on more ballast and
reduced the engine speed. By midnight the wind force was 8 - 9 on the Beaufort scale and the
waves were about 10 m high. The engine speed was reduced further.
In the early hours of 27 November, two very large waves hit the ship in quick succession
and the master estimated that the crest of the first wave was under the centre of the ship
when the second wave broke over the fore of the ship. There was a loud rumbling noise and
the vessel broke in two (see Fig. 6). Both parts remained afloat: although they did collide, no
casualties were reported.

Fig. 6. Fore and aft sections of the World Concord after failure in November 1954.
 Classic brittle failures in large welded structures 123

The break in the vessel occurred approximately midships at the position of a transverse
bulkhead. The T-shaped bottom longitudinals were jointed to the transverse bulkheads by
welded vertical brackets. Also, as the longitudinals were scalloped, filling-in flat bars were
welded between the bottom plates and the longitudinals at the bulkhead connections. This
resulted in two regions of stress concentration at the bulkhead position, one at the vertical
bracket and one at the filling-in plate.
It was thought that the fracture initiated at one of these two stress concentration regions
associated with a bottom longitudinal near the starboard side. The fracture propagated in a
brittle manner in two directions along the line of the transverse bulkhead. In one direction it
ran across the bottom of the ship, up the port side and back across the deck to the starboard
side, and in the other direction along the bottom of the vessel and up the starboard side. The
final separation of the two halves of the tanker took place at the starboard deck-to-hull angle
where the sheer strake and deck stringer plate were severely distorted.
The steel plating for the hull and deck was 20 to 31 mm thick. The bilge strakes, deck
stringers and sheer strakes were of "special quality" steel, meeting the requirements of
Section 7 of the Rules for Quality and Testing Materials used by Lloyd's Register in 1950 but
with the extra condition of 0.23% maximum C content. The remaining plates were of
"ordinary shipbuilding quality" by early 1950s standards.
The investigation into the failure revealed that the Charpy V notch properties of much of
the hull plate were poor at the casualty temperature ( - 1 2 C) with absorbed energies less
than 27 J. (Most of the "special quality" plates had Charpy energies above 40 J at 12 C.)
Furthermore, the ballasting condition of the ship, which was considered to be correct at the
time, did in fact result in high stress levels in the bottom plating. Although the quality of
welding was good with no significant defects, the combination of low toughness material, high
stress levels and shock loading due to wave action resulted in conditions that the structure
could not withstand.
This failure, and others, led to the changes in classification society rules regarding notch
toughness of steels used in welded ships, the design of structural details and control of
welding quality. In 1957 Lloyd's Register incorporated mandatory minimum Charpy require-
ments into its Rules. These requirements were for at least 47 J absorbed energy and 30%
fibrous fracture appearance at 0 C. Maximum permitted levels of carbon, silicon, manganese,
phosphorus and sulphur were also introduced to ensure weldability.
The World Concord was repaired and operated under another name until 1974.

5. THE KINGS B R I D G E

In the 25 years between the collapse of the Hasselt Bridge and the failure of the Kings
Bridge in Melbourne, Australia, much knowledge had been gained regarding the safety of
welded bridges. However, as this failure illustrates, the expertise has to be available to those
involved in the design and fabrication of welded structures, especially when new grades of
material are involved.
On the morning of 10 July 1962, after 15 months in service, the steel girders of a span near
one end of the Kings Bridge failed under the weight of a passing 48 tonne vehicle [20].
Complete collapse of the span was prevented by the concrete deck catching on the vertical
wall slabs under the bridge. The bridge was closed to traffic pending investigations and repair.
The Kings Bridge, which is a welded plate girder bridge with a concrete deck, was built
between 1957 and 1961. The bridge is in three sections and the failure occurred in the 1 km
long high-level section constructed of alternate cantilever and suspended spans. The failed
span had four suspended steel plate girders approximately 30 m in length which were
supported by cantilevers extending from the adjacent spans. Each girder was made up of two
flange plates welded to a web plate. Vertical stiffeners were welded to the web at regular
intervals. To increase the thickness in the region of maximum stress, cover plates had been
welded to the lower flanges of the girders over their central portions.
The 365 N mm -2 yield strength steel (to BS 968:1941) used in construction was known to
have restricted weldability and the specification for the bridge required precautions to be
124 B. HAYES
taken in welding. The investigation into the failure, however, found hydrogen cracks at the
toes of the transverse welds at the end of the cover plates in over 50% of the girders
fabricated for the bridge. A combination of improper welding procedures, inadequate
preheat, and the failure to dry the low-hydrogen electrodes properly with local stress
elevation due to design, was thought to be the cause of the formation of the hydrogen cracks.
In the span which failed, the hydrogen cracks had penetrated the flange in three of the
girders [21]. During the winter of 1961 one of the inner girders failed but this had remained
undetected. The crack in the second inner girder extended by fatigue along the web until, in
the winter of 1962, the conditions of crack length, load and temperature for rapid brittle
fracture were met (see Fig. 7). The outer two girders of the span failed at the same time in a
brittle manner. Chemical analysis of the broken girders showed much of the material to have
carbon contents greater than the specified maximum of 0.23%.
The Royal Commission into the failure of the Kings Bridge [22] found that the inexperience
of the fabricator in welding low-alloy steel and the highly variable quality of the steel used
were major factors in the failure. The steel supplied was not adequately tested and the toe
cracks were not detected by either the fabricator or the Country Roads Board inspectors. The
lack of clear and precise specifications for manufacture, testing and inspection was contribu-
tory as was the failure to investigate fully the proposed type of steel before construction was
undertaken.

6. A S H L A N D T A N K

The last failure to be described is interesting because the defect which triggered the collapse
of the storage tank involved had been present in the tank since its original construction at
least 40 years earlier.
On 2 January 1988, tank No. 1338 at the Ashland Petroleum Company's Floreffe terminal
in Pennsylvania was being filled to capacity with diesel fuel oil for the first time since its
re-erection at this site the previous August [23, 24]. The temperature of the oil was 8 C and
the air temperature was - 3 C. At 5.00 p.m., when the oil level was almost at the operating

Fig. 7. Failed girder in Kings Bridge: (a) general view, (b) view of initiation region at end of cover
plate.
 Classic brittle failuresin large weldedstructures 125
maximum, the tank shell fractured vertically without warning. The tank shell parted from the
bottom plate at the connecting welds and, under the force of the escaping oil, moved
sideways about 35 m. The tank roof to shell joint remained sufficiently intact for the roof to
move with the shell.
The escaping oil flowed over the surrounding dykes, damaging an adjacent tank, and passed
through storm sewers into the Monongahela river and then the Ohio river. The total spillage
was estimated at 15.2 million litres, causing severe harm to the environment and affecting the
drinking water supply.
The tank had been built originally at Whiskey Island in Ohio some time in the 1930s-1940s.
It was a 36 m diameter cylindrical tank with a flat bottom and supported conical roof. The
shell was approximately 14.4 m high and consisted of six courses of welded plate, each plate
being about 2.4 m x 9.6 m. The plate thickness in the bottom course was 21 ram, and 6 mm in
the top course. The thicknesses of courses 2 to 5 lay between these.
The tank capacity was 16,000 m 3 or 16 million litres and until 1986 it had been used to hold
distillate oils and heavier distillates. In 1986 the tank was taken down by oxyacetylene cutting
adjacent to the original welds and then reassembled by welding in Floreffe, keeping the plates
in the same order.
Examination of the fracture faces in the tank shell showed them to be flat and
perpendicular to the plate surfaces, with the characteristic chevron markings of brittle
fracture. The chevron markings pointed back to a flaw below the weld between the first and
second courses, at the point where a vertical weld on the second course met the circumferen-
tial weld. The flaw was described as being "dime-size" or about the size of a 5 pence piece
(see Fig. 8), and its orientation was in the vertical direction of the tank. Metallographic
studies of the flaw revealed it to be caused by flame cutting, rather than welding but,
surprisingly, not the flame cutting of the dismantling procedure. The flaw had been present in
the steel plate prior to being welded when the tank was originally built.
Charpy V notch tests and drop-weight tests (Pellini) to measure the nil-ductility transition
(NDT) temperature were performed on the shell plate. The parent material was an ASTM
A10 steel, either rimmed or semi-killed. The NDT temperature was found to be +10 C and
at +3 C, the estimated temperature of the tank wall at failure, the Charpy tests showed low
energy absorption. However, engineering defect assessments using fracture toughness values
measured at +3 C indicated that the stress due to the hydrostatic pressure alone (approxi-
mately 80 N mm -2) would not have been sufficient to trigger failure. Soil foundation analyses
were also carried out and subsidence was ruled out as a contributory factor.
Attention was then turned to the influence that the weld adjacent to the flaw may have
had. Welding residual stresses may be as high as the yield strength level. In the case of the
Ashland tank this would have meant that the flaw was subject to a stress level of
approximately 240 N mm -2. Furthermore, the effect of the welding heat cycle on the material
at the crack tip was thought to have caused locally intensified strain-ageing embrittlement
[15], to which steels of this type and vintage are susceptible. This was confirmed by fracture
toughness testing of shell plate samples simulating this form of embrittlement.
From this it was concluded that the failure was due to the material immediately surrounding
the flaw being of particularly low toughness, with crack initiation occurring under the
combined effect of hydrostatic and residual stresses. As the tank was operating below the
NDT temperature of the shell plate, the crack emerging from the locally embrittled area
could not be arrested.
This failure highlighted a potentially serious problem associated with re-welding and weld
repairs of older steels which may be susceptible to dynamic strain-ageing embrittlement. The
fracture in May 1981 of a pressure vessel which had been built in 1958 [25] was also found to
be due to strain-ageing embrittlement associated with welding carried out seven months prior
to the failure.

7. CONCLUSION

These cases illustrate that brittle fracture can have dramatic consequences. Although only
failures in large structures were considered here, brittle fracture also arises in small structures
26 B. HAYES

Fig. 8. Initiating defect in Ashland oil storage tank which failed in January 1988 (reproduced from [24]
courtesy of Ashland Petroleum Co. and Battelle).

and components. M a n y c o n f e r e n c e s a n d p u b l i c a t i o n s h a v e b e e n d e v o t e d to t h e s u b j e c t a n d
t h e i n t e r e s t e d r e a d e r is r e f e r r e d to t h e c o n s i d e r a b l e l i t e r a t u r e a v a i l a b l e .

Acknowledgements--The author would like to express her thanks to the Department of Trade and Industry and the
industrial members of TWI, who jointly funded the work from which this review is extracted.

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 Classic brittle failures in large welded structures 127

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