Great video clip. I had a job once at the US Steel Pipe Works, Geneva Plant, Utah where I took "slag temperatures" before they sprayed "devils liquor" sump water on it to cool it down. I wore wooden shoe "clogs" to protect my shoes from melting (the same kind coke oven operators wear when servicing the ovens). 24 hours after a "thimble car" dump of red-hot slag was made, I went out and traversed the dump-site, measuring congealed slag surface temperatures, sometimes up to and often exceeding 600 degrees F. I wore thick canvas over-clothes, but anywhere my body came into pointed contact with the canvas (elbows and knees) I would get "burned" because of the heat transferred from the canvas material through my regular clothes. The heat at breathing height was about 200 degrees F. I wore a face shield (clear) to protect my face from the heat and had to wear a scarf over my nose to prevent breathing in super-heated air. As it was, I still singed the hairs inside my nose if I inhaled a little too quickly. Imagine walking around inside a pizza oven, that is what it felt like. It dried me out, like desiccating me from the inside out breathing in all that super hot and very dry air. Watching the thimble cars dump slag at night was one of the most incredible visual experiences I have ever had. The second after they tip a thimble, when the splash of red hot slag boiling down the slope glows intensely red, there follows milliseconds later, a "blast" of intense infrared radiation, that hits you in the face like a gust of hot wind. The sea-gulls around dusk, would often ride the intense thermals created by the super-heated air, drawing cooler air up from below the slag pits, combining with the hot air whoosh it would go, rushing up the precipitous cliffs, man-made mini-mountains of slag, there they would fly along the thermals updraft about 100 feet up and nearly parallel to the rail car dump line. Their white underbelly's "glowing" brilliantly orange, phoenix like they hovered there almost motionless reflecting the bright yellow-orange and red hues of the cooling slag. It was like they were on fire it was so bright in the fading light of the day. It was the only beautiful sight to see in an otherwise desolate and foreboding wasteland of glassy rock-like congealed blast furnace slag. Geneva Works is now defunct. mrc109
Part of me would love to see that kind of stuff--it would fascinate me. And another part would be scared shitless, because if I have any phobia, it's burning. Thanks for the account.
While I never saw the slag being dumped, I lived in Duquesne, PA in the late 1940s. The street I lived on dead ended at the edge of a large hollow not too far from where the slag had been dumped. I think it had been stopped some time before me, because as kids, we would see how far up the slag dump we could climb. I had to be about 8 years old when I got about 50 feet up, before I lost control when the surface started to crumble causing me to start sliding back down. I turned around into a sitting, crab-like position as I slid down the hill on my butt while the rough sandpaper-like slag tore out the seat of my pants and ground my palms to raw flesh. I'll never forget that experience as long as I live and I am currently 84.
@@TomokosEnterprize That was in the days that cap guns were legal. My cousin and I had cap guns and holsters and played cowboys and shot off roll after roll of caps. They came 5 rolls to the box, 50 shots to the roll and we would buy many boxes. We played Tom Mix, Hopalong Cassidy, Bad Baskim, Red Ryder, The Lone Ranger and more. Had to go down to the movie theater on 1st Street to see the westerns at the matinee or listen to the stories on radio. It would be another 3 years before I even laid eyes on a TV. Nowadays when I go to the range the smell of the gun smoke reminds me of my childhood.
Reading this is we grew up on the same time when bare feet, drinking from a sun heated hose and the long walk to that Saturday movie. You forgot Buck Rogers and if lucky enough to be let in Our Man Flint, Threes more of course but I thought those would spark up a couple more memories for ya. OH YEA, 3 Stooges and Dean Martin and Jerry lewis too eh, LOL. Such carefree days going back there eh. Why not throw in any thing by/of Walt Disney too.@@tem1939
The cone shaped thing falling out of the slag pot is the fire brick liner which holds all the heat. If it weren't for that, the steel slag pot would glow red/yellow hot and burn itself out. After dumping, the slag cars are taken to the skulling dept where they are re bricked. They are preheated to bake the brick B4 reloading. Then they are sprayed with a high temp parting agent to keep the slag from sticking. If not, then comes the jack hammer or oxygen lance to burn out the hardened slag
As a young child, Dad used to takes us to watch them dump slag at night. It was entertainment you got for free. It was also educational. And when all was dark and they dumped the slag it was almost as good as fireworks, at least to us,lol.
I really enjoyed watching this. Just a fascinating little snapshot of industrial processes. To me, these kind of authentic videos are some of the best content on RUclips.
The men operating those machines were probably making good money. Putting their kids through college while making their house payments, watching football on the weekends and drinking with their buddies after work. All with their high school diplomas on the wall and their union membership in their wallet. Days lost forever.
My dad was a Bethlehem Steel shipyard worker for 36 years. I was the last of his six children. The last three of us indeed did go to college, with two of us eventually getting master's degrees. He had a third grade education. My dad told me when I was seven that when I grew up that the shipyard would probably be closed. He said I needed to get a good education if I was going to have a shot at a decent living. The man was a prophet. The Hoboken yard closed in 1984. It was torn down years later and the land that it once occupied now has luxury condos that face the Hudson River across from the skyscrapers in Manhattan.
Some of us gen x still living the dream.23 yrs Ibew, 6 figures,all the toys,beach house,living the dream.of course you have to be willing to WORK and GET DIRTY, which is basically a death sentence to these soft , brainwashed millennials
@@captainzumafishing772capta9 no offense but ive seen what hard work does and it isnt beneficial, most older men i see are basically cut off from free life by health affects by time they even reach just 50+, alot of men with hip replacements at 40+ unable to go back into work. i do renovations on empty houses so i dont sit in an office but sometimes i think the same money for keeping my body just a bit less worn might be better in the end. each to there own id rather work smarter not harder.
@@ffgdfgvhhg7191 bullshit, heroin cocaine and marijuana were rampant in the 70s. The only difference today is you can get stronger meds legally from the pharmaceutical companies. This world is truly going to shit. I rebuilt train engines for a company sub contracted by the railroads.. Got no railroad benefits, shit wages, no legal qualification.. All while we pulled in record numbers and the bosses (ex railroad) made their 6 figures and did nothing.
PS: Never dump slag into a pit with standing water. They did that here and the resulting steam explosion scattered red hot chunks of slag all over the plant, burning cars and some buildings. It was quite exciting at the time. They dumped the slag right at the side of the blast furnace. They had two pits and alternated, filling one while the other one was being cleaned out. It was the first pour for the new pit-and it had rained for a couple of days. Nobody thought...
I think I was working at either Republic or Inland Steel and heard a story about someone losing a thimble full of hot slag over the end of a dock a long time ago. The resulting steam explosion killed the guy who lost control of it and did extensive damage to the dock because the thimble was ejected in the explosion and I suppose smashed into the dock on the way out. It caused one helluva commotion that's for sure. Steel plants can be spooky and unnerving to work in if you dont go there and get acclimated to where everything is and how things are moved around inside the plant. There are areas I think it was inside the BOF shop that the noise was so loud you could not hear yourself think. Earplugs with a headset hearing protector didnt work because if you take away any kind of recognizable noise, there can be a Euclid backing up on top of you an you would not hear the back-up beeper. Spooky, things get unreal when the ground vibrates, your body vibrates and you can't hear anything, the mind starts playing tricks about what ifs and could it be that? It will turn you into a nervous wreck, jumpy and afraid to have your back to any open spaces behind you because they use Euclids and trains to move pig-cars and every thing else all around the plant. If the space is more than 15 feet wide just about anything could be behind you. RR tracks are everywhere crossing this way and that, and they disappear into a building and come out the other end. You never know if the next blind corner you go around you might have a train on the tracks you are crossing.
@@mrc109 a hellish place i would say... and i complain about working on a bottling line with glass bottles smashing around, pneumatic capper machine and hot juice filler :)
Boy that's no lie that happened at our foundry, it was a miracle that no one died. Loudest explosion I've ever heard so much dirt in there I couldn't see two inches in front of my face. After the dust settled and everybody was accounted for they're like well boys fire'm back up I was shaking like a leaf I was on the furnace floor when that happened
Idk why there’s just something incredibly erie about this video. The fact it’s hard to tell whether it’s early morning or just about to become nighttime, or the grainy footage, the lack of dialogue from anyone in the video, the rusted machinery, the dark red slag pools dripping down the dark rocky cliff side. It’s all just insanely creepy and feels like I almost wasn’t meant to stumble across this
not only captured it, but years later threw up a hailmary and converted it to upload it. who the heck would think this was interesting but here i am amazed
@Eddie J Parsons: Bethlehem Steel went Bankrupt not long after this video was shot. There are many reasons for the demise of our domestic steel, it's not as simple as just outsourcing, or enviro-laws. Everyone had a hand in it: the companies; the unions, the government; and the consumers. Changing market factors took a big toll, too. ( the bottom pretty much dropped out of the market for heavy structural steel and seamless steel pipe, for example. No demand = no money, and thus no mill and no jobs.) Of their four big steel making plants, only one is still operational- and it isn't this one. (i'm assuming this is at Bethworks, in PA). Lackawana, NY was torn down long ago, a victim of obsolescence, non-reinvestment, and NYS wanting them to spend 10s of Billions to clean up the site of contamination going back more than 100 years. ( they bought the mill from another company) There's virtually nothing left of it but the harbor. Sparrows Point, MD was just torn down- there are vids of the demolition on here. That mill was built to supply their shipmaking ops at that site. No more Bethlehem, no more demand for ships to build = no more mill... They were bought out, too, and eventually went under. Bethlehem, PA. Much of the plant still stands, like the blast furnaces, ore bridge, and many of the old brick mill buildings. It shut down all operations by the end of the 1990's. The coke ovens, byproduct chemical plant, and other stuff is long gone. There is a small museum of sorts there, a new casino, and they have concerts and stuff there with the blast furnaces as a backdrop. I drove by there a few months back- if you've never seen one up close, the sheer scale of the place is immense!! Burns Harbor, IN. Still operational, now owned by Arcelor-Mittal. It was their newest and most modern plant. Built in the late 1960's as a replacement for the Lackawana works, which was then left to wither and die. AM has pumped a TON of money into modernizing and upgrading it, and it's still cranking out steel. They also own and operate the old Inland Steel plant in East Chicago, IN. And that's my novel for the day.
+pyroman6000 I took a defunct of the old Bethlehem works a couple years ago. The tour guides worked there years before and were retired. They said the biggest cause of the decline was unions forcing of wages.
davejase Father actually worked in coke works, some transferred 2 buffalo 2 finish out pension in mid 90's. The story of steel is long and almost everything has its boon and bust cycles. OSHA, EPA, healthcare, venture capitalist(buying and stripping assets/pensions) , cheaper steel all played a part. The mill got shut down in phases and father was lucky few ,2 last the longest. Ended up working for penndot and collected 1 pension check from both places before dying of colon cancer.
This was one of two iconic things for me about Bethlehem Steel. When visiting my grandparents and crossing the Minsi Trail bridge, there was the purple flames of the blast furnaces, and you could see the glow from the slag at their house in Hellertown. There was also sulfur that could be smelled when the slag was dumped.
is there any danger to the fumes of the slag thats dumped? and is there any ecological risks to doing so? i'm just curious, but i would imagine they thought of these things before hand and picked a proper site and such
I hadn't heard the name of that bridge in a good 30+ years. My dad called it the noise bridge because it had a metal bottom in the middle that would make a noise when you drove across it. Both my grandfather and step dad worked at Bethlehem Steel for a time and my grand parents lived in Hellertown near Crossroads Pizza. Thx for the memory.
Back in the early 90's I was a patrolman for the City Of Bethlehem Police Department and on a slow night shift , which wasn't very often, I would park along side of Easton Rd. and watch the slag being dumped from on top of the slag piles, although I have never witnessed a volcanic eruption I know what it looks like! Glad I got to witness this happening.
I used to live in Hammond, IN 30+ years ago. Dad worked at Inland Steel and I remember seeing the sky turning orange at night when they were dumping the slag.....
My Grandfather on my Moms side was an Engineer at the Bethlehem Steel plant in Buffalo... 1940's through 60's (my folks have pictures of him running Steam switchers). By the time I was old enough to remember him in the 70's he was retired... good man.
My Dad attended Lehigh University in the late thirties. He talked about how spectacular it looked at night. Seeing it happen years later gives me an idea of what he often talked about. Gone for Ever! Videos like this is all that's left. Thanks!
@@baileystark7629 Because Bethlehem steel was run into the ground. Failed to modernize and couldn't compete with cheaper offshore steel...plus dumping all this toxic crap in an area that is now surrounded by suburbs would not work well.
Slag is not excess steel. It is the melted iron ore after the iron has been extracted combined with the melted limestone which acts as a flux carrying away impurities. The iron is heavier than the slag and floats on top of the molten iron like oil on top of water It is from the blast furnace. But converter furnaces such as the Basic Oxygen Furnace & electric arc furnace can have slag too. It is put in slag cars and dumped.
Hey boss, I know this was a while ago, but I'm hoping you're still around to answer this question: Can you still extract minute amounts of steel from that molten mix they are dumping? I am wondering how efficient the process is, let's just say I'm an amateur knife maker and I want to gather up some ore to make one, could I take a hammer and chisel to a chunk of that stuff, bring it home and still get some usable steel from it?
Several people have commented back to me that they liked my narration about a similar kind of slag dumping operation I witnessed and where I did my small part in a research project. Thank you to everyone who liked what I might have added to the sights and sounds of the Bethlehem Steel slag dumping video posted by Steelmanjules. I feel like I have almost hijacked the post now, which this is certainly not what this is supposed to be about. Like so many things about the integrated iron and steel industry, the experience of being there, seeing firsthand, what few outsiders will ever get the chance to see, and a lot of it is almost beyond description. The iron and steel making process is almost "primordial" in that the conditions required to make iron are a lot like those that happened when the Earth was in its infancy, hotter than hell and lots of it going on all the time. The process of iron and steelmaking never sleeps. The reason why I was at US Steel, Geneva Works was we were hired to get scientific information necessary for US Steel to get a certificate of compliance from the US EPA concerning the amount and kinds of different VOC's (volatile organic compounds) given off from the process of spraying Devil's Liquor sump waste onto very hot slag. This process of spraying the sump waste achieved two separate ends, it got rid of a large volume of the mill process water, which I believe was mostly a mill scale stripping/cooling liquid, contaminated with high amounts of iron oxide (which is red) plus some chemical surfactants and hydrocarbons, so hence the name "Devil's Liquor" (and it smelled kinda funky too). The other important thing about spraying the water on the hot slag (where it promptly evaporated) is that it assisted in the cool down of the red hot slag so that a huge D-9 Caterpillar equipped with a huge ripper blade mounted on the rear end of the Cat could get out on the still very hot but solidified slag and break it up for crushing and grading (sizing) by the boys at IMS (International Mill Services). It almost hurt my ears listening to that caterpillar working out on that hot slag. I can't imagine how long grease and oil lasts on all the lubricated surfaces comprising the wheels and tracks of a caterpillar working on top of 600 degree plus slag, but judging by the sounds of things, it wasn't very long. It squealed like a banshee going forwards or backwards it didn't matter. I pitied the Cat operator. Sitting on top of 6 tons of hot iron all day, working inside a probably not-to-well air-conditioned cab, it must have been pretty rough. Its hard to imagine what the engine oil temperature was inside that diesel, but those Cats sit pretty low to the ground, and the amount of radiant heat still coming off that red hot slag (in places) was ferocious. I have been to many different Integrated Iron and Steel plants throughout the United States (Burns Harbor, Granite City, Inland Steel, Gary works, LTV Steel, Republic, Armco (K.C.), AK Steel, Middletown, and an Electric Arc Furnace in Georgetown S.C.. I could go on and on about the many different sights and sounds, but this is probably not the right place to do this. I don't have any video to show (most of the Steel plants I went into would not let us take photographs, let alone video)! If anybody else has any ideas how or even if I should tell more about my iron and steel making "stories" let me know if you are interested. I also worked inside the Perry Nuclear Power Plant (Ohio). I helped to perform a pitot tube traverse on a 64 inch diameter return cooling-water line to the reactor. I also assisted in the recording of a series of wet-bulb and dry-bulb relative humidity measurements on one of those humongous circular, concrete, natural draft cooling towers. Working deep inside the bowels of a fully operational nuclear power plant is an even more rare and difficult to come by experience than working inside a steel plant. mrc109
@@cremlywelton5126 There was that period in RUclips history where they made you use a Google+ account. Likely they made a new account rather than transferring the old one over.
Its used for making 'cinder' blocks combined with cement for building, different grades; mixed with brick clay to make 'grogged' clay - around Northants (England) you will find the hardest bricks you've ever drilled into; slag is also used in various ways for roadbuilding, from ballast to tarmac, foundations to top surface. Mind you, there are plenty of slags around Corby, but that's something else.
BF slag makes some of the worst road ballast. It is porous and is okay for the first few years, but then it begins to crumble into what looks like fine sand. Indiana Rt 49 between Chesterton and Valparaiso used BF slag for ballast when being built from scratch. Within 15 years, the road bead was dug up and replace with real gravel.
i went to Lehigh University back in 2005-2009 Freshman used to sneak into the abandoned Bethlehem Steel for fun it is an amazing space, titanic steampunk looking facility, pipes weave across the entire structure and ancient machines of unknown function decorated the space, it was sad but very beautiful.
My father still works at the remnants of this plant, Arcelor Mittal. You wouldn't believe the steel history they've scrapped back along those tracks and acres of land. It's a shame, but that's business.
Very satisfying watching this so many years later in 2021; glad it popped up in the algo. My father worked at the USS Clairton works for 52 years, and my grandfather worked at that same plant 42 years; I grew up watching scenes like this all the time, I’m a senior now . Back when we used to still make stuff here in the US☹️
I briefly worked at Edgar Thompson as a temporary loader operater for Local 66. It was for a recycling outfit that was cut rate. I was running a 992 Cat loader. Euc's or Terex I can't remember would come in and dump slag. I would dump the slag into seperating screens. There were Cat Tractors hauling the slag pots to be dumped. The heat they held was really something. I wasn't there long. The dust would sparkle when the sun hit it like glitter. You'd blow your nose and it was like coal dust coming out.
@@needsaride15126 Ok , thank you for clarifying that for me . That's where he went when the Nanticoke plant shut down or was shutting down . Sorry for any confusion
SiO2, Al2O3, CaO, MgO, TiO2, Fe etc. Mainly the Ca, Al and Si. These are used for removing the Oxygen from the iron-stone. Mainly the Ca and Al is used to ensure, that the new Al2O3 mixed with CaO will be separated from the Fe so you get a very clear steel. The slag depends on what kind of steel you want to produce....low alloy, or high carbid etc.
Iron produced from taconite in a blast furnace is reduced using CO and/ or H2. Fluxing materials react with and/ or absorb the impurities such as S. Scrap is often fed to blast furnaces along with the taconite pellets, (hematite Fe2O3), and is a source of problematic impurities such as Zn and Pb, which can form a pinch point in the BF stack or form a clinker in the sump of the BF if not sufficiently soluble in the molten flux or iron..
It’s fascinating driving some of the rural roads in the area and seeing all the derelict plants in the countryside. Highly recommend. The rolling hills and farm fields are also beyond beautiful.
@@zakiducky I think the Sands sold it to some other company. I don't know much about the mall but they added an amazing catwalk over the furnaces, an open air concert stage, and a lot of parking for events and other festivals. The casino paid for most of it so...I guess it was a net gain for the community.
My wife's gramps was a crane operator at Bethlehem steel on lake Erie in buffalo new York for 36 years. Union steelman. Interesting video. Rest on peace Carl
My dad worked for Bethlehem Steel in Johnstown PA, from 1966 to 1994. The plant actually closed in 1992, but he stayed on for two more years because he was a foreman, and dealt with the physical removal and processing of machinery.
My father was assistant GM in 75 then got transfered to Lackawanna from 76-83 then back to Johnstown for a year in 83, then retired. Such a sad time when the mills were closing
The cooled slag is then broken up and sold to China. They turn it into a fine powder, add a binder to it, and mold it into any shape desired. It is then painted and sold in the USA at upscale outlet mall stores. This is also what is used to make Harbor Freight Tools and the latest Craftsman made in China tools.
I'm 39 and my Farher used to worked for Bethlehem Steel. He was born in 52', worked there from 58', till 62'. At 8 years old, he was a foreman at local 401. He used to take me to work with him from 1972-1980. I was born in 1983 though. I miss those days..
My great grandfather worked in the Seattle steel mill through most of his life as an electrician! His name was Sylvester Sessions. He was an electrician who served in ww2 as a plane technician/electrician on the USS Cowpens in the pacific theatre. He was a good man who passed away a few years ago but i still hold him dear in my heart and i will always remember him and the stories he and my grandfather used to have.
@@manavshah8335 I would love to! He lived in Boise for the last chunk of his life and he had this gorgeous backyard. Rhubarb, pear trees, apple trees. Absolutely gorgeous. We visited around once a year and i was always a little shit when i was younger and extremely distractable! Well this one year, he brought us over and made us amazing pear rhubarb pie. We all sat down and usually, i would get distracted and be out playin around or reading. But this year, something about one of his stories caught my ear. Back in his navy days, they got their rations and typically werent allowed other foods (specifically heavily perishables like meats). Well one year for christmas, he and a bunch of his buddies decided to sneak a canned christmas ham onboard. One by one they passed it through their lines and lockers until it reached my grandpas at the very end. A few days pass and they all decide "screw it we're all hungry, lets eat it." So they ate it, but one of them had forgotten to notice, it had been pierced by a piece of metal in one of the lockers and had rotted. They all missed the good christmas ham so they didnt notice but a few hours later, they sure as hell did. But my grandpa, ABSOLUTELY not wanting to go to sick bay (bottom of the boat next to torpedo bullseye) toughed through it and decided to puke over the boat. Welllll his commander caught him and he was sent STRAIGHT to sick bay screaming to not go! He was a good man and im surprised he remembered after almost 80 years but ill never forget that story.
Pretty sure this is the most interesting train video I've ever seen. Nice to see how it was done. I like that they use the dragline to bang the slag out of the cars!
A similar thing was done at the Workington Iron & Steel Company, Workington Cumbria England. But the slag was used to build Sea Defences for the plant and the the docks on the north side of the river Derwent. The slag pile went to over 131 foot along the southern shore line. the plant is now closed and the land redeveloped and part of the slag bank has been quarried for aggregate.
I was picking up a load at Steel Dynamics in Columbia City, Indiana and got to watch from afar as they dumped a load of slag at dusk. Quite a spectacular show.
I had a pilot buddy that domiciled out of norhthern NJ flying for UAL out of JFK for little over 3o year career. A few times on approach to the NYTCA he saw "the Steel" in Bethlehem dumping slag from perhaps 10,000 feet + - on decent into Long Island. He said it was quite the specticl even from that distance (2 miles) at night.........
I used to see this at the Park Hill, PA slag dump when I went with my father to pick up truckloads of processed slag. What a difference from those days to now...I'm so glad I got out of there when I did. The railroad that serviced the Johnstown plant was the Conemaugh & Black Lick, as I recall.
This reminds me of Armco Steel, when I was a kid. They would melt the slag and load it into rail cars, with flames coming out of the top, and the train would roll up to the Middletown plant to be finished. As a teenager, the orange glow of melted steel lit up the night sky
I went to Middletown to do an emissions inventory with several other guys. That plant was so large they literally created their own weather system above it. It could be raining or snowing inside the plant but nowhere else. I could not drink the water there, too salty. Even the distilled water I bought tasted salty to me. Yecch! We stayed in one of the larger cities away from the plant for better accommodations and better tasting water! Someplace around there had a continuous caster capable of producing a 96 inch wide piece of steel. I remember seeing a big sign saying it was (then) the largest continuous caster in the world. I think the rolling mill plant was one mile long, the biggest building I had ever seen then and up to now. Do you remember the plant I am describing?
@@mrc109 absolutely. I live in the village where Armco had their coke plant. They'd fill train cars with the molten products, you could see the orange flames come out of the top. They had a set of dedicated tracks that went straight to the Middletown plant. I was telling my daughter just yesterday that when the plant was still there, everything in the village I live in would have a coat of black soot on it. It was worse up in Middletown. The steelworks plant in Middletown was the 2nd largest employer in Butler County, GM was #1, from the 50s-80s. It was also the #1 source of air pollution and water pollution. The Middletown works were impressive though. You are telling the truth about it's own weather system though. My best friends dad worked there and I have actually experienced it. Ww thought it was just a tall tale but nope, it could rain at the Works but nowhere else. You are remembering it accurately 👍🏻
@@mrc109 not a chance lol. When I was a kid, the water here had so much lime in it that you could actually see tiny white slivers in it. If you used ice cubes, they'd leave bits in your drink. There were high metal levels in the water too. And the air always tasted like metal. The only thing nice about it was the view from my back yard at night. You could see the orange glow in the horizon from the Middletown works and see the flames from the slag cars as they headed towards Middletown. Like some kind of flaming Devil train.
During college I worked on a section gang on the PB and NE which is the switching railroad seen in this clip. One of the summers, in August, we were assigned to work on the tracks in this section of the plant. After dumping for a certain period of time, the tracks needed to be moved out to the edge so that the pots could continue to dump. That was our assignment, and we were there for about 3 weeks.. hot sun, heat radiating from the ground and a little metal shack that we had to stoop down to sit in for breaks . There is a reason that they put the college crew on that job! Not sure that I would last a whole day in that heat at this point in my life :)
Jason, I work for the railroad that tool over the PBNE rails... Where the Coke plants were is where our current Intermodal yard is... I'm trying to figure out where exactly they dumped the slag... in other words... How far away from the Coke works was the dump? I have a general idea of where is it was.... but looking for clarification. Thnx
just saw this post.. I looked at the area in google maps.. a lot changes in 40 years! i suspect that the area is now under some of those huge distribution buildings, but i could not say for sure. what is your role on the railroad? Generations of my family spent their careers on the PB & NE @@s.hannibal6565
Nice. This takes me back. There used to be a huge slag dump near where I grew up at, then in the late '70s they shut it down and built shopping centers there.
Impressive. I remember a slag dump gone wrong in Newcastle Australia in the early 80's where the slag was dumped into a pit full of rain water. Loudest explosion I've ever heard. It scared the crap out of us kids and I bet the truck driver suffered permanent hearing loss.
I remember seeing this kind of thing as a kid growing up in Tacoma WA at the old ASARCO smelter. They dumped it right into the bay so there was the bright hot slag and clouds of steam when it hit the water. There are still hundreds of those same cone shaped shells from the slag cooling in the bucket.
Just stumbled on this video, what memories! I grew up just a few miles away from the coke works, and the blast furnaces of what used to be Bethlehem Steel (true natives would have said "Bethlum Steel") The steam plumes of quenched coke, the waft of steam overhead. Dad would take us kids down to watch the slag dumps. He started out in the coke works, at the end of the "Corporate run" he was a senior technician in Research. All gone now, nothing left but a gambling casino and show stage.
Ahhh, nothing like the smell of roasting coke ovens early in the morning. Somebody ought to write a song about it, "Nothing could be finer than to smell the burning fires in the morning"
There’s plenty of Bethlehem Steel coal mines that used metalurgic coal for steel in this area. It’s interesting to learn they mined and made steel with the same coal.
I'd never heard of 'metalurgic coal' before and when I google I'm told it's just good coal for making coke to make steel. There are mines in my part of the world that produced both coal and iron ore but as different products from different seams.
@@huw3851 yes this area has most of metallurgic coal mined. They mine “steam” coal or bituminous now. It’s used to power the remaining steam power plants.
@@83jbbentley I misunderstood what you meant by ''metallurgic coal' - I suspect it's American for coking coal. 😀 The mines are long gone in my part of the world but they used to be distinguished by their product - household/shipping/coking coal.
Er, I think you mean "aluminum". Because it's a superior (lighter, non-rusting) material for car bodies and has been recognized as such since literally 1974. This corresponds very well to the period of time when the world lost interest in massive steel cars and massive steel buildings, thus dooming Bethlehem Steel to two decades of painful death via old age. It's also worth mentioning that Alcoa is doing just fine and is still cranking out aerospace-grade aluminum and titanium in the state of Pennsylvania. Heavy industry is not dead in America; obsolete heavy industry died back in the 70s and will never come back.
this video was 15 years old when it showed up in my recommendations. I watch comedy videos and videos about famous writers. youtube 2022 let’s fkn go 😂
Basic slag is a byproduct of steelmaking by the basic version of the Bessemer process or the Linz-Donawitz process. It is largely limestone or dolomite which has absorbed phosphate from the iron ore being smelted. Because of the slowly-released phosphate content, as well as for its liming effect, it is valued as fertilizer in gardens and farms in steelmaking areas.
My welding instructor worked at Bethlehem back in the day, apparently the whole crews used to chill and eat lunch at Slag Dumping time cause it was the best entertainment back then; they didn’t have their phones to watch while they munched.
Your right. The slag is tapped out of what is referred to as the "Cinder Tap. The Iron tap is located lower because the iron is on the bottom. The Blast furnace is presurized @ 18.5 PSI to 40 PSI. The molten iron& slag is suspended on the pocket of air mid furnace. The "Valve man" lowers the pressure and the slag is even with the Cinder tap. There is a brick plug that holds the iron/slag in the furnace. This is drilled out, the clay is injected with the Mud gun plugging the hole..
Авто/Мото
I love how no matter how much youtube changes over time, it's always the videos like this that resurface out of nowhere lmao
Exactly, I didn't expect to see a 15 year old (technically 28 year old) video popping up on my homepage,
but I'm not complaining! :)
Lol for real
Same and everytime it pops up and see the "uploaded XX year's" I feel older
Yep, there is even temple of the RUclips algorithm with its faithfulls
It's a classic RUclips move
Great video clip. I had a job once at the US Steel Pipe Works, Geneva Plant, Utah where I took "slag temperatures" before they sprayed "devils liquor" sump water on it to cool it down. I wore wooden shoe "clogs" to protect my shoes from melting (the same kind coke oven operators wear when servicing the ovens). 24 hours after a "thimble car" dump of red-hot slag was made, I went out and traversed the dump-site, measuring congealed slag surface temperatures, sometimes up to and often exceeding 600 degrees F. I wore thick canvas over-clothes, but anywhere my body came into pointed contact with the canvas (elbows and knees) I would get "burned" because of the heat transferred from the canvas material through my regular clothes. The heat at breathing height was about 200 degrees F. I wore a face shield (clear) to protect my face from the heat and had to wear a scarf over my nose to prevent breathing in super-heated air. As it was, I still singed the hairs inside my nose if I inhaled a little too quickly.
Imagine walking around inside a pizza oven, that is what it felt like. It dried me out, like desiccating me from the inside out breathing in all that super hot and very dry air.
Watching the thimble cars dump slag at night was one of the most incredible visual experiences I have ever had. The second after they tip a thimble, when the splash of red hot slag boiling down the slope glows intensely red, there follows milliseconds later, a "blast" of intense infrared radiation, that hits you in the face like a gust of hot wind.
The sea-gulls around dusk, would often ride the intense thermals created by the super-heated air, drawing cooler air up from below the slag pits, combining with the hot air whoosh it would go, rushing up the precipitous cliffs, man-made mini-mountains of slag, there they would fly along the thermals updraft about 100 feet up and nearly parallel to the rail car dump line. Their white underbelly's "glowing" brilliantly orange, phoenix like they hovered there almost motionless reflecting the bright yellow-orange and red hues of the cooling slag. It was like they were on fire it was so bright in the fading light of the day. It was the only beautiful sight to see in an otherwise desolate and foreboding wasteland of glassy rock-like congealed blast furnace slag.
Geneva Works is now defunct.
mrc109
What an awesome account. Very well written but somewhat sad at the same time.. I think I pictured it just as you saw it.
excelente relato felicitaciones y muchas gracias con cariño luis
Nice and eloquent description. Thanks for sharing your experiences.
Marios Damoulianos gracias , que buen informe tan especial , un fuerte abrazo , con cariño albert felicitaciones
Part of me would love to see that kind of stuff--it would fascinate me. And another part would be scared shitless, because if I have any phobia, it's burning. Thanks for the account.
While I never saw the slag being dumped, I lived in Duquesne, PA in the late 1940s. The street I lived on dead ended at the edge of a large hollow not too far from where the slag had been dumped. I think it had been stopped some time before me, because as kids, we would see how far up the slag dump we could climb. I had to be about 8 years old when I got about 50 feet up, before I lost control when the surface started to crumble causing me to start sliding back down. I turned around into a sitting, crab-like position as I slid down the hill on my butt while the rough sandpaper-like slag tore out the seat of my pants and ground my palms to raw flesh. I'll never forget that experience as long as I live and I am currently 84.
Duquesne is rougher than that slag pile now, the crime.
It was soooo much fun being 8 and without fear eh.
@@TomokosEnterprize
That was in the days that cap guns were legal. My cousin and I had cap guns and holsters and played cowboys and shot off roll after roll of caps. They came 5 rolls to the box, 50 shots to the roll and we would buy many boxes. We played Tom Mix, Hopalong Cassidy, Bad Baskim, Red Ryder, The Lone Ranger and more. Had to go down to the movie theater on 1st Street to see the westerns at the matinee or listen to the stories on radio. It would be another 3 years before I even laid eyes on a TV.
Nowadays when I go to the range the smell of the gun smoke reminds me of my childhood.
Reading this is we grew up on the same time when bare feet, drinking from a sun heated hose and the long walk to that Saturday movie. You forgot Buck Rogers and if lucky enough to be let in Our Man Flint, Threes more of course but I thought those would spark up a couple more memories for ya. OH YEA, 3 Stooges and Dean Martin and Jerry lewis too eh, LOL. Such carefree days going back there eh. Why not throw in any thing by/of Walt Disney too.@@tem1939
1994 was closer to when this video was uploaded than when this video was uploaded to today.
Don't
@@idrinkmilk282 🤷
Today's dinosaurs and pyramids analogy
The cone shaped thing falling out of the slag pot is the fire brick liner which holds all the heat. If it weren't for that, the steel slag pot would glow red/yellow hot and burn itself out. After dumping, the slag cars are taken to the skulling dept where they are re bricked. They are preheated to bake the brick B4 reloading. Then they are sprayed with a high temp parting agent to keep the slag from sticking. If not, then comes the jack hammer or oxygen lance to burn out the hardened slag
what is it made out of beceause thats what can put a human being on the sun
@@johhnyytwotime510 😂
Thank you sir for the additional insight
It’s made of unicorn ivory.
sir are you still alive
As a young child, Dad used to takes us to watch them dump slag at night. It was entertainment you got for free. It was also educational. And when all was dark and they dumped the slag it was almost as good as fireworks, at least to us,lol.
Same i also watched this with my dad back then
Same here in Finland! Dad took me and grandpa to watch this. I'll never forget it, it looked like a volcano. Grandpa was equally impressed.
it probably looked very cool. it's also insightful to how production functions. better than youtube.
Where was this?
@@bobsmith962 Bethlehem pa
this video is old enough to be recommended to me twice now, once 8 years ago and once again today.
I really enjoyed watching this. Just a fascinating little snapshot of industrial processes. To me, these kind of authentic videos are some of the best content on RUclips.
The men operating those machines were probably making good money. Putting their kids through college while making their house payments, watching football on the weekends and drinking with their buddies after work. All with their high school diplomas on the wall and their union membership in their wallet. Days lost forever.
My dad was a Bethlehem Steel shipyard worker for 36 years. I was the last of his six children. The last three of us indeed did go to college, with two of us eventually getting master's degrees. He had a third grade education.
My dad told me when I was seven that when I grew up that the shipyard would probably be closed. He said I needed to get a good education if I was going to have a shot at a decent living.
The man was a prophet. The Hoboken yard closed in 1984. It was torn down years later and the land that it once occupied now has luxury condos that face the Hudson River across from the skyscrapers in Manhattan.
Some of us gen x still living the dream.23 yrs Ibew, 6 figures,all the toys,beach house,living the dream.of course you have to be willing to WORK and GET DIRTY, which is basically a death sentence to these soft , brainwashed millennials
@@captainzumafishing772capta9 no offense but ive seen what hard work does and it isnt beneficial, most older men i see are basically cut off from free life by health affects by time they even reach just 50+, alot of men with hip replacements at 40+ unable to go back into work. i do renovations on empty houses so i dont sit in an office but sometimes i think the same money for keeping my body just a bit less worn might be better in the end. each to there own id rather work smarter not harder.
@@ffgdfgvhhg7191 bullshit, heroin cocaine and marijuana were rampant in the 70s. The only difference today is you can get stronger meds legally from the pharmaceutical companies. This world is truly going to shit.
I rebuilt train engines for a company sub contracted by the railroads.. Got no railroad benefits, shit wages, no legal qualification.. All while we pulled in record numbers and the bosses (ex railroad) made their 6 figures and did nothing.
There’s still money like this to be made, kids just have to be lucky to find the opportunity
PS: Never dump slag into a pit with standing water. They did that here and the resulting steam explosion scattered red hot chunks of slag all over the plant, burning cars and some buildings. It was quite exciting at the time. They dumped the slag right at the side of the blast furnace. They had two pits and alternated, filling one while the other one was being cleaned out. It was the first pour for the new pit-and it had rained for a couple of days. Nobody thought...
Ok i wont next time. Thanks for that
I Hate when that happens. Lol
I think I was working at either Republic or Inland Steel and heard a story about someone losing a thimble full of hot slag over the end of a dock a long time ago. The resulting steam explosion killed the guy who lost control of it and did extensive damage to the dock because the thimble was ejected in the explosion and I suppose smashed into the dock on the way out. It caused one helluva commotion that's for sure.
Steel plants can be spooky and unnerving to work in if you dont go there and get acclimated to where everything is and how things are moved around inside the plant. There are areas I think it was inside the BOF shop that the noise was so loud you could not hear yourself think. Earplugs with a headset hearing protector didnt work because if you take away any kind of recognizable noise, there can be a Euclid backing up on top of you an you would not hear the back-up beeper. Spooky, things get unreal when the ground vibrates, your body vibrates and you can't hear anything, the mind starts playing tricks about what ifs and could it be that? It will turn you into a nervous wreck, jumpy and afraid to have your back to any open spaces behind you because they use Euclids and trains to move pig-cars and every thing else all around the plant. If the space is more than 15 feet wide just about anything could be behind you. RR tracks are everywhere crossing this way and that, and they disappear into a building and come out the other end. You never know if the next blind corner you go around you might have a train on the tracks you are crossing.
@@mrc109 a hellish place i would say...
and i complain about working on a bottling line with glass bottles smashing around, pneumatic capper machine and hot juice filler :)
Boy that's no lie that happened at our foundry, it was a miracle that no one died. Loudest explosion I've ever heard so much dirt in there I couldn't see two inches in front of my face. After the dust settled and everybody was accounted for they're like well boys fire'm back up I was shaking like a leaf I was on the furnace floor when that happened
This is making a comeback thanks to recommendations.
Idk why there’s just something incredibly erie about this video. The fact it’s hard to tell whether it’s early morning or just about to become nighttime, or the grainy footage, the lack of dialogue from anyone in the video, the rusted machinery, the dark red slag pools dripping down the dark rocky cliff side. It’s all just insanely creepy and feels like I almost wasn’t meant to stumble across this
Can't disagree, also I feel like the entire railcar was going to fall.
It's a video of a steel factory taking a shit.
@@RIMESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS yes but a morning shit? An evening shit? In 1994 in the middle of nowhere? Still creepy af
The fact that someone captured this on film is great.
Yeah, in Israel back then
Uh, Bethlehem Steel is in Pennsylvania.
not only captured it, but years later threw up a hailmary and converted it to upload it. who the heck would think this was interesting but here i am amazed
@@oreziopancrazio3685 you dumb lmao
tape, actually
@Eddie J Parsons: Bethlehem Steel went Bankrupt not long after this video was shot. There are many reasons for the demise of our domestic steel, it's not as simple as just outsourcing, or enviro-laws. Everyone had a hand in it: the companies; the unions, the government; and the consumers. Changing market factors took a big toll, too. ( the bottom pretty much dropped out of the market for heavy structural steel and seamless steel pipe, for example. No demand = no money, and thus no mill and no jobs.)
Of their four big steel making plants, only one is still operational- and it isn't this one. (i'm assuming this is at Bethworks, in PA). Lackawana, NY was torn down long ago, a victim of obsolescence, non-reinvestment, and NYS wanting them to spend 10s of Billions to clean up the site of contamination going back more than 100 years. ( they bought the mill from another company) There's virtually nothing left of it but the harbor.
Sparrows Point, MD was just torn down- there are vids of the demolition on here. That mill was built to supply their shipmaking ops at that site. No more Bethlehem, no more demand for ships to build = no more mill... They were bought out, too, and eventually went under.
Bethlehem, PA. Much of the plant still stands, like the blast furnaces, ore bridge, and many of the old brick mill buildings. It shut down all operations by the end of the 1990's. The coke ovens, byproduct chemical plant, and other stuff is long gone.
There is a small museum of sorts there, a new casino, and they have concerts and stuff there with the blast furnaces as a backdrop. I drove by there a few months back- if you've never seen one up close, the sheer scale of the place is immense!!
Burns Harbor, IN. Still operational, now owned by Arcelor-Mittal. It was their newest and most modern plant. Built in the late 1960's as a replacement for the Lackawana works, which was then left to wither and die. AM has pumped a TON of money into modernizing and upgrading it, and it's still cranking out steel. They also own and operate the old Inland Steel plant in East Chicago, IN.
And that's my novel for the day.
+pyroman6000 I took a defunct of the old Bethlehem works a couple years ago. The tour guides worked there years before and were retired. They said the biggest cause of the decline was unions forcing of wages.
Union greed had more to do with the demise of US steel than any politician ever did.
pyroman6000 thiers also a steel mill buy Pittsburgh pa with two operational blast furnaces. Only have about 9000 people left though.
davejase Father actually worked in coke works, some transferred 2 buffalo 2 finish out pension in mid 90's. The story of steel is long and almost everything has its boon and bust cycles. OSHA, EPA, healthcare, venture capitalist(buying and stripping assets/pensions) , cheaper steel all played a part. The mill got shut down in phases and father was lucky few ,2 last the longest. Ended up working for penndot and collected 1 pension check from both places before dying of colon cancer.
pyroman dropped
knowledge
youtube algo: now is the right time to recommend this in people's timelines
This was one of two iconic things for me about Bethlehem Steel. When visiting my grandparents and crossing the Minsi Trail bridge, there was the purple flames of the blast furnaces, and you could see the glow from the slag at their house in Hellertown. There was also sulfur that could be smelled when the slag was dumped.
oh yummy the smell of rotten eggs, how iconic. Stop trying to romanticize BS.
@@jerrynadler2883 I didn't like the smell but I did like the glow. It was fascinating.
is there any danger to the fumes of the slag thats dumped? and is there any ecological risks to doing so? i'm just curious, but i would imagine they thought of these things before hand and picked a proper site and such
@@glizzygulper8948 LOL! proper site, im dying, your a funny guy
I hadn't heard the name of that bridge in a good 30+ years. My dad called it the noise bridge because it had a metal bottom in the middle that would make a noise when you drove across it. Both my grandfather and step dad worked at Bethlehem Steel for a time and my grand parents lived in Hellertown near Crossroads Pizza. Thx for the memory.
Back in the early 90's I was a patrolman for the City Of Bethlehem Police Department and on a slow night shift , which wasn't very often, I would park along side of Easton Rd. and watch the slag being dumped from on top of the slag piles, although I have never witnessed a volcanic eruption I know what it looks like! Glad I got to witness this happening.
ain't nothing changed, beth'lem still crime ridden
I used to live in Hammond, IN 30+ years ago. Dad worked at Inland Steel and I remember seeing the sky turning orange at night when they were dumping the slag.....
fiberman45 there is still a few videos of this floating around RUclips. Definitely a sight to see
My Grandfather and Grandmother lived in Hammond. Grandad worked his whole life in the oil refinery in whiting. Eventually ended up running the place.
@@Joe-Mamasixtyninefourtwenty Back when it was called Standard Oil I bet?
I'm from Calumet city.
My Grandfather on my Moms side was an Engineer at the Bethlehem Steel plant in Buffalo... 1940's through 60's (my folks have pictures of him running Steam switchers). By the time I was old enough to remember him in the 70's he was retired... good man.
This brings me back to '94 when I dumped slag at Bethlehem Steel
Thank u sir 🫡
My Dad attended Lehigh University in the late thirties. He talked about how spectacular it looked at night. Seeing it happen years later gives me an idea of what he often talked about. Gone for Ever! Videos like this is all that's left. Thanks!
Why do people not do this anymore?
@@baileystark7629 they do it in poorer countries now where they can do the same job with no safety or environmental laws for pennies on the dollar
Hhi
@@baileystark7629 Because Bethlehem steel was run into the ground. Failed to modernize and couldn't compete with cheaper offshore steel...plus dumping all this toxic crap in an area that is now surrounded by suburbs would not work well.
Slag is not excess steel. It is the melted iron ore after the iron has been extracted combined with the melted limestone which acts as a flux carrying away impurities. The iron is heavier than the slag and floats on top of the molten iron like oil on top of water It is from the blast furnace. But converter furnaces such as the Basic Oxygen Furnace & electric arc furnace can have slag too. It is put in slag cars and dumped.
You have been awarded then honor of: Super Hero for a day!
Ah cool! Always wondered how it worked. Just last week was gold panning in a river and found a chunk of slag and seems like youtube read my mind!
Hey boss, I know this was a while ago, but I'm hoping you're still around to answer this question: Can you still extract minute amounts of steel from that molten mix they are dumping? I am wondering how efficient the process is, let's just say I'm an amateur knife maker and I want to gather up some ore to make one, could I take a hammer and chisel to a chunk of that stuff, bring it home and still get some usable steel from it?
Thank you for saving me 2 minutes on Google.
Thank you ! Was curious as to what I was watching
This is the most metal thing I’ve seen all day
How a 16 year old video of something that happened 30 years ago lands in my feed, I'll never know. But, thank you anyway!
Several people have commented back to me that they liked my narration about a similar kind of slag dumping operation I witnessed and where I did my small part in a research project.
Thank you to everyone who liked what I might have added to the sights and sounds of the Bethlehem Steel slag dumping video posted by Steelmanjules. I feel like I have almost hijacked the post now, which this is certainly not what this is supposed to be about.
Like so many things about the integrated iron and steel industry, the experience of being there, seeing firsthand, what few outsiders will ever get the chance to see, and a lot of it is almost beyond description. The iron and steel making process is almost "primordial" in that the conditions required to make iron are a lot like those that happened when the Earth was in its infancy, hotter than hell and lots of it going on all the time. The process of iron and steelmaking never sleeps.
The reason why I was at US Steel, Geneva Works was we were hired to get scientific information necessary for US Steel to get a certificate of compliance from the US EPA concerning the amount and kinds of different VOC's (volatile organic compounds) given off from the process of spraying Devil's Liquor sump waste onto very hot slag. This process of spraying the sump waste achieved two separate ends, it got rid of a large volume of the mill process water, which I believe was mostly a mill scale stripping/cooling liquid, contaminated with high amounts of iron oxide (which is red) plus some chemical surfactants and hydrocarbons, so hence the name "Devil's Liquor" (and it smelled kinda funky too). The other important thing about spraying the water on the hot slag (where it promptly evaporated) is that it assisted in the cool down of the red hot slag so that a huge D-9 Caterpillar equipped with a huge ripper blade mounted on the rear end of the Cat could get out on the still very hot but solidified slag and break it up for crushing and grading (sizing) by the boys at IMS (International Mill Services).
It almost hurt my ears listening to that caterpillar working out on that hot slag. I can't imagine how long grease and oil lasts on all the lubricated surfaces comprising the wheels and tracks of a caterpillar working on top of 600 degree plus slag, but judging by the sounds of things, it wasn't very long. It squealed like a banshee going forwards or backwards it didn't matter. I pitied the Cat operator. Sitting on top of 6 tons of hot iron all day, working inside a probably not-to-well air-conditioned cab, it must have been pretty rough. Its hard to imagine what the engine oil temperature was inside that diesel, but those Cats sit pretty low to the ground, and the amount of radiant heat still coming off that red hot slag (in places) was ferocious.
I have been to many different Integrated Iron and Steel plants throughout the United States (Burns Harbor, Granite City, Inland Steel, Gary works, LTV Steel, Republic, Armco (K.C.), AK Steel, Middletown, and an Electric Arc Furnace in Georgetown S.C.. I could go on and on about the many different sights and sounds, but this is probably not the right place to do this. I don't have any video to show (most of the Steel plants I went into would not let us take photographs, let alone video)!
If anybody else has any ideas how or even if I should tell more about my iron and steel making "stories" let me know if you are interested. I also worked inside the Perry Nuclear Power Plant (Ohio). I helped to perform a pitot tube traverse on a 64 inch diameter return cooling-water line to the reactor. I also assisted in the recording of a series of wet-bulb and dry-bulb relative humidity measurements on one of those humongous circular, concrete, natural draft cooling towers.
Working deep inside the bowels of a fully operational nuclear power plant is an even more rare and difficult to come by experience than working inside a steel plant.
mrc109
did you not see the face at the top of the right piller
Nice stores mate.. It's a good read.. You should send some of these storeys to a magazine or something..:-)
Steve Cummins
I would be interested in your steel plant stories. Do you have them online anywhere, or a book perhaps?
Thank you!
what is going on between you and mrc109? Why are your pics the same?
@@cremlywelton5126 There was that period in RUclips history where they made you use a Google+ account. Likely they made a new account rather than transferring the old one over.
Its used for making 'cinder' blocks combined with cement for building, different grades; mixed with brick clay to make 'grogged' clay - around Northants (England) you will find the hardest bricks you've ever drilled into; slag is also used in various ways for roadbuilding, from ballast to tarmac, foundations to top surface.
Mind you, there are plenty of slags around Corby, but that's something else.
BF slag makes some of the worst road ballast. It is porous and is okay for the first few years, but then it begins to crumble into what looks like fine sand. Indiana Rt 49 between Chesterton and Valparaiso used BF slag for ballast when being built from scratch. Within 15 years, the road bead was dug up and replace with real gravel.
@@somaday2595 sounds like the issue we've had in Nashville. Good shit though guys thanks for your comments.
Lol, slags and chavs, love 'em!
Hi guys. We've been chosen by RUclips algorithms.
i went to Lehigh University back in 2005-2009
Freshman used to sneak into the abandoned Bethlehem Steel for fun
it is an amazing space, titanic steampunk looking facility, pipes weave across the entire structure and ancient machines of unknown function decorated the space, it was sad but very beautiful.
When you’re still on your phone at 1 in the morning and you find yourself on this side of youtube again.
My father still works at the remnants of this plant, Arcelor Mittal. You wouldn't believe the steel history they've scrapped back along those tracks and acres of land. It's a shame, but that's business.
I’d love to hear more. If you wouldn’t mind.
2007 is already further away from us than 1994 was in 2007.
RUclips algorithm: "Hey you might like this."
Me, a man of culture and slag: "Ah yes, yes interesting, interesting."
very satisfying when the crusted shells fall out
😂
just like the devil picking his nose
Was gonna comment the same thing but ummm u beat me to it 5 years ago lol
They call them “skulls” which makes it even more metal.
Yes, like taking a good Dump you've been holding in.
Very satisfying watching this so many years later in 2021; glad it popped up in the algo. My father worked at the USS Clairton works for 52 years, and my grandfather worked at that same plant 42 years; I grew up watching scenes like this all the time, I’m a senior now . Back when we used to still make stuff here in the US☹️
I briefly worked at Edgar Thompson as a temporary loader operater for Local 66. It was for a recycling outfit that was cut rate. I was running a 992 Cat loader. Euc's or Terex I can't remember would come in and dump slag. I would dump the slag into seperating screens. There were Cat Tractors hauling the slag pots to be dumped. The heat they held was really something. I wasn't there long. The dust would sparkle when the sun hit it like glitter. You'd blow your nose and it was like coal dust coming out.
One day, USA will produce things again. Will be a hell of a goood time when it happens.
My Dad retired from Clairton works I believe . Wasn't that in Croydon , PA . If that's the one that's where he retired from
@@johnwells2177 Clairton coke works along the Mon river outside of Pittsburgh. Edgar Thompson Works is in Braddock also near Pittsburgh Pa.
@@needsaride15126 Ok , thank you for clarifying that for me . That's where he went when the Nanticoke plant shut down or was shutting down . Sorry for any confusion
Absolutely incredible. Thank you to the brave men who pioneered this and who have kept it going since.
This 1994 video looks so archaic. Makes me feel old!
SiO2, Al2O3, CaO, MgO, TiO2, Fe etc. Mainly the Ca, Al and Si. These are used for removing the Oxygen from the iron-stone. Mainly the Ca and Al is used to ensure, that the new Al2O3 mixed with CaO will be separated from the Fe so you get a very clear steel. The slag depends on what kind of steel you want to produce....low alloy, or high carbid etc.
Iron produced from taconite in a blast furnace is reduced using CO and/ or H2. Fluxing materials react with and/ or absorb the impurities such as S. Scrap is often fed to blast furnaces along with the taconite pellets, (hematite Fe2O3), and is a source of problematic impurities such as Zn and Pb, which can form a pinch point in the BF stack or form a clinker in the sump of the BF if not sufficiently soluble in the molten flux or iron..
13 years after it was posted and it showed up in my recommended videos...
Same here. That's the algorithm for ya.
@@go_rizzo_grow and nothing. Go put on Undertow and smoke another one. That's my plan for the the next hour also.
yeh just like the US mail!!!
So, this is the algorithm's will today?
Aight then.
Yeah... Kinda wondering about that myself.
✋
This is how the Omnissiah speaks to us!
The algorithms strike again, boys... Let's have it for another 15 years!
Damn 2007 RUclips hit me in my feels
It’s fascinating driving some of the rural roads in the area and seeing all the derelict plants in the countryside. Highly recommend. The rolling hills and farm fields are also beyond beautiful.
This plant became a casino and arts center :)
@@cmdrls212 Yeah, this one is the Sands Casino now iirc? I’ve been there long ago, nice place. Big but empty mall though lol
@@zakiducky I think the Sands sold it to some other company. I don't know much about the mall but they added an amazing catwalk over the furnaces, an open air concert stage, and a lot of parking for events and other festivals. The casino paid for most of it so...I guess it was a net gain for the community.
Even more beautiful when covered in layer of molten metal
You don't feel safe around true nature do you?
I've seen this video so many times as a kid! I miss those days!
this is how i remember the 90s. not a cell phone in sight. just people living in the moment
Yeah, because modern steel mill workers are on their phones all day and doent even know that their best friend is taking a 2000 °C bath
@@ruzasuka correct. modern steel workers are all millenials who are obsessed with their cellular devices.
@@ViewVue5 How old are you?
@@ruzasuka old enough to know better than to chat with a ninny like you. good day.
@@ViewVue5 I dont like to use that word, but you're hell of a boomer. Have a good day.
I dumped a slag the other day. And about time after having 20 years and 3 kids together!
hahahaha quality :)
Like that carriage in the video. Moving on.
hahaha love it :)
British humor
"9 rings were given to the men"
9 rings to mortal men, doomed to die...
Albert Wesker 🤣
"...whom above all things desire power..."
'Puild me an army worthy of Mordor'
But they were all of them deceived
Here from mr ballens retelling of the TECO accident in Tampa. To know those men died experiencing pain from this type of material is heart wrenching.
I read a twitter thread about this, then it shows up in my recommended 🤔
My wife's gramps was a crane operator at Bethlehem steel on lake Erie in buffalo new York for 36 years. Union steelman. Interesting video. Rest on peace Carl
Fun fact: in England, “slag” is a derogatory term sometimes applied to a promiscuous woman.
The same applies here in Australia.
@rats arsed That's just sad.
And the French word for slag is "ordure" which is slang for bastard .
Gives dumping slag a new meaning
Thank you youtube algoritmh for showing me this 15 year old video, it was worth it.
I don’t know why this got recommended to me but thanks RUclips.
My dad worked for Bethlehem Steel in Johnstown PA, from 1966 to 1994. The plant actually closed in 1992, but he stayed on for two more years because he was a foreman, and dealt with the physical removal and processing of machinery.
Must have been sad the last 2 years
@@bobsmith962 If it was, he never showed it.
My father was assistant GM in 75 then got transfered to Lackawanna from 76-83 then back to Johnstown for a year in 83, then retired. Such a sad time when the mills were closing
@@jeffdaggett7761 Yeah. Thanks for replying to my comment. Makes me feel less isolated in my family history.
The cooled slag is then broken up and sold to China. They turn it into a fine powder, add a binder to it, and mold it into any shape desired. It is then painted and sold in the USA at upscale outlet mall stores. This is also what is used to make Harbor Freight Tools and the latest Craftsman made in China tools.
Are you serious about that?
The punch line was at the end.
I mean... I could totally see it
Ahh grade A Chinesium. The best pop metal around.
Cobb Knobbler the biggest wooosh known to man
It is crazy the lengths they had to go to create the lava planet from Revenge of the Sith.
I can't believe they really threw Hayden into the molten slag. Looked very realistic though.
Idk why this is recommended to me after 15 years
Mr Norris, Your baths is now ready
Hahaha lmaoo
What the hell...
Underrated comment 👏 lol
Yeah, the elderly are always cold and need a shawl, or a slag dump.
My great-grandma and my grandpa worked there. He mentioned plenty of people who never finished their shift. Really dangerous work back when
"plenty of people"
🙄
I'm 39 and my Farher used to worked for Bethlehem Steel. He was born in 52', worked there from 58', till 62'. At 8 years old, he was a foreman at local 401. He used to take me to work with him from 1972-1980. I was born in 1983 though. I miss those days..
My great grandfather worked in the Seattle steel mill through most of his life as an electrician! His name was Sylvester Sessions. He was an electrician who served in ww2 as a plane technician/electrician on the USS Cowpens in the pacific theatre. He was a good man who passed away a few years ago but i still hold him dear in my heart and i will always remember him and the stories he and my grandfather used to have.
Sorry for your loss mate, would you care to share a story of your grandfather's?
@@manavshah8335 I would love to! He lived in Boise for the last chunk of his life and he had this gorgeous backyard. Rhubarb, pear trees, apple trees. Absolutely gorgeous. We visited around once a year and i was always a little shit when i was younger and extremely distractable! Well this one year, he brought us over and made us amazing pear rhubarb pie. We all sat down and usually, i would get distracted and be out playin around or reading. But this year, something about one of his stories caught my ear. Back in his navy days, they got their rations and typically werent allowed other foods (specifically heavily perishables like meats). Well one year for christmas, he and a bunch of his buddies decided to sneak a canned christmas ham onboard. One by one they passed it through their lines and lockers until it reached my grandpas at the very end. A few days pass and they all decide "screw it we're all hungry, lets eat it." So they ate it, but one of them had forgotten to notice, it had been pierced by a piece of metal in one of the lockers and had rotted. They all missed the good christmas ham so they didnt notice but a few hours later, they sure as hell did. But my grandpa, ABSOLUTELY not wanting to go to sick bay (bottom of the boat next to torpedo bullseye) toughed through it and decided to puke over the boat. Welllll his commander caught him and he was sent STRAIGHT to sick bay screaming to not go! He was a good man and im surprised he remembered after almost 80 years but ill never forget that story.
@@sethgokey8161 Oh well that's humourous. thank you so much for sharing this memory with me, enjoyed it immensely :)
Pretty sure this is the most interesting train video I've ever seen. Nice to see how it was done. I like that they use the dragline to bang the slag out of the cars!
Look up the "Loram Rail Grinder at night".
A similar thing was done at the Workington Iron & Steel Company, Workington Cumbria England. But the slag was used to build Sea Defences for the plant and the the docks on the north side of the river Derwent. The slag pile went to over 131 foot along the southern shore line. the plant is now closed and the land redeveloped and part of the slag bank has been quarried for aggregate.
For someone that has visited the steel works in bethleham a lot, this video is amazing.
I was picking up a load at Steel Dynamics in Columbia City, Indiana and got to watch from afar as they dumped a load of slag at dusk. Quite a spectacular show.
I had a pilot buddy that domiciled out of norhthern NJ flying for UAL out of JFK for little over 3o year career. A few times on approach to the NYTCA he saw "the Steel" in Bethlehem dumping slag from perhaps 10,000 feet + - on decent into Long Island. He said it was quite the specticl even from that distance (2 miles) at night.........
domiciled wow
I used to see this at the Park Hill, PA slag dump when I went with my father to pick up truckloads of processed slag. What a difference from those days to now...I'm so glad I got out of there when I did.
The railroad that serviced the Johnstown plant was the Conemaugh & Black Lick, as I recall.
Thanks for posting this video !
Watching this with industrial techno is a hell of a ride 😳
I wonder if Jimmy Hoffa's somewhere underneath that slag pile.
If you drop your keys in a river of molten slag, let them go, because man, they're gone.
thanks captain obvious!
ramonda snellgrove Philosophy at his highest... hahahahaha
Nirky is that a joke about women? xD
Thug life this guy... ^
+Nirky Thanks Mr Handy
3 of my fam have worked at Bethlehem steel. I was able to see the place once most of it was shut down. Just an enormous rusty beauty of a plant.
The tubs look like the thrusters of a downed spacecraft in an 80s sci fi movie 😍
This reminds me of Armco Steel, when I was a kid. They would melt the slag and load it into rail cars, with flames coming out of the top, and the train would roll up to the Middletown plant to be finished. As a teenager, the orange glow of melted steel lit up the night sky
I went to Middletown to do an emissions inventory with several other guys. That plant was so large they literally created their own weather system above it. It could be raining or snowing inside the plant but nowhere else. I could not drink the water there, too salty. Even the distilled water I bought tasted salty to me. Yecch! We stayed in one of the larger cities away from the plant for better accommodations and better tasting water! Someplace around there had a continuous caster capable of producing a 96 inch wide piece of steel. I remember seeing a big sign saying it was (then) the largest continuous caster in the world. I think the rolling mill plant was one mile long, the biggest building I had ever seen then and up to now. Do you remember the plant I am describing?
@@mrc109 absolutely. I live in the village where Armco had their coke plant. They'd fill train cars with the molten products, you could see the orange flames come out of the top. They had a set of dedicated tracks that went straight to the Middletown plant. I was telling my daughter just yesterday that when the plant was still there, everything in the village I live in would have a coat of black soot on it. It was worse up in Middletown. The steelworks plant in Middletown was the 2nd largest employer in Butler County, GM was #1, from the 50s-80s. It was also the #1 source of air pollution and water pollution. The Middletown works were impressive though. You are telling the truth about it's own weather system though. My best friends dad worked there and I have actually experienced it. Ww thought it was just a tall tale but nope, it could rain at the Works but nowhere else. You are remembering it accurately 👍🏻
@@bethroesch2156 What about the water quality? Could you drink the water no problem? Even the soft drinks tasted salty to me.
@@mrc109 not a chance lol. When I was a kid, the water here had so much lime in it that you could actually see tiny white slivers in it. If you used ice cubes, they'd leave bits in your drink. There were high metal levels in the water too. And the air always tasted like metal. The only thing nice about it was the view from my back yard at night. You could see the orange glow in the horizon from the Middletown works and see the flames from the slag cars as they headed towards Middletown. Like some kind of flaming Devil train.
During college I worked on a section gang on the PB and NE which is the switching railroad seen in this clip. One of the summers, in August, we were assigned to work on the tracks in this section of the plant. After dumping for a certain period of time, the tracks needed to be moved out to the edge so that the pots could continue to dump. That was our assignment, and we were there for about 3 weeks.. hot sun, heat radiating from the ground and a little metal shack that we had to stoop down to sit in for breaks . There is a reason that they put the college crew on that job! Not sure that I would last a whole day in that heat at this point in my life :)
Jason, I work for the railroad that tool over the PBNE rails... Where the Coke plants were is where our current Intermodal yard is... I'm trying to figure out where exactly they dumped the slag... in other words... How far away from the Coke works was the dump? I have a general idea of where is it was.... but looking for clarification. Thnx
just saw this post.. I looked at the area in google maps.. a lot changes in 40 years! i suspect that the area is now under some of those huge distribution buildings, but i could not say for sure. what is your role on the railroad? Generations of my family spent their careers on the PB & NE @@s.hannibal6565
I love these random videos from back in the day, always hits the “is this secretly analog horror?”
This video title sounded like the greatest heavy metal concert in history... Never been so disappointed with a videos content in my life!
Nice. This takes me back. There used to be a huge slag dump near where I grew up at, then in the late '70s they shut it down and built shopping centers there.
I love how day instantly turned into night when the thing starteg going out.
This is the RUclips I knew and loved before Susan became CEO
Impressive. I remember a slag dump gone wrong in Newcastle Australia in the early 80's where the slag was dumped into a pit full of rain water. Loudest explosion I've ever heard. It scared the crap out of us kids and I bet the truck driver suffered permanent hearing loss.
This is...satisfying to watch, especially when the skull comes out.
I remember seeing this kind of thing as a kid growing up in Tacoma WA at the old ASARCO smelter.
They dumped it right into the bay so there was the bright hot slag and clouds of steam when it hit the water.
There are still hundreds of those same cone shaped shells from the slag cooling in the bucket.
Yeah
its now on the nation worst toxic waste site
Why RUclips is recommending this, I have no idea
The algorithm gods have brought me deep into the archives today!
Just stumbled on this video, what memories!
I grew up just a few miles away from the coke works, and the blast furnaces of what used to be Bethlehem Steel (true natives would have said "Bethlum Steel")
The steam plumes of quenched coke, the waft of steam overhead.
Dad would take us kids down to watch the slag dumps. He started out in the coke works, at the end of the "Corporate run" he was a senior technician in Research.
All gone now, nothing left but a gambling casino and show stage.
Ahhh, nothing like the smell of roasting coke ovens early in the morning. Somebody ought to write a song about it, "Nothing could be finer than to smell the burning fires in the morning"
I'll never forget dumping my first slag
Every time one of these yt videos with obscure titles and an unusual amount of views appear on my feed I instantly watch it
Looks like a landscape from another Planet.
There’s plenty of Bethlehem Steel coal mines that used metalurgic coal for steel in this area. It’s interesting to learn they mined and made steel with the same coal.
I'd never heard of 'metalurgic coal' before and when I google I'm told it's just good coal for making coke to make steel. There are mines in my part of the world that produced both coal and iron ore but as different products from different seams.
@@huw3851 yes this area has most of metallurgic coal mined. They mine “steam” coal or bituminous now. It’s used to power the remaining steam power plants.
@@83jbbentley I misunderstood what you meant by ''metallurgic coal' - I suspect it's American for coking coal. 😀 The mines are long gone in my part of the world but they used to be distinguished by their product - household/shipping/coking coal.
thank you so much for this i really needed this im happy! :o)
15yrs old and it just popped up in my recommended videos 💯THANK YOU, YT ALGORITHM....HERE IS A ‘W’!!
We all forget how much the car manufacturers used steel for cars, before they started using plastics
Er, I think you mean "aluminum". Because it's a superior (lighter, non-rusting) material for car bodies and has been recognized as such since literally 1974. This corresponds very well to the period of time when the world lost interest in massive steel cars and massive steel buildings, thus dooming Bethlehem Steel to two decades of painful death via old age.
It's also worth mentioning that Alcoa is doing just fine and is still cranking out aerospace-grade aluminum and titanium in the state of Pennsylvania. Heavy industry is not dead in America; obsolete heavy industry died back in the 70s and will never come back.
Most modern cars are still made out of steel
Damn, they really out here dumping slag at Bethlehem Steel in 1994.
this video was 15 years old when it showed up in my recommendations. I watch comedy videos and videos about famous writers. youtube 2022 let’s fkn go 😂
Great camera man. They did a great job showing all aspects of this dump. This was really interesting to see.
Mordor??
Hey your here, I’m just 6 years late.
@@johnnyrocket6588 He needs to read up on this before he comments again: ruclips.net/video/RtlCPgmTbiY/видео.html
@@Woodlands_View_Guest this link is to a video about the orange haired fox. 😂 is that the get educated you mean??
Basic slag is a byproduct of steelmaking by the basic version of the Bessemer process or the Linz-Donawitz process. It is largely limestone or dolomite which has absorbed phosphate from the iron ore being smelted. Because of the slowly-released phosphate content, as well as for its liming effect, it is valued as fertilizer in gardens and farms in steelmaking areas.
Sometimes the RUclips algorithm does a little to much coke… but that’s ok, because it brought all all together to witness this beautiful moment
My welding instructor worked at Bethlehem back in the day, apparently the whole crews used to chill and eat lunch at Slag Dumping time cause it was the best entertainment back then; they didn’t have their phones to watch while they munched.
Your right. The slag is tapped out of what is referred to as the "Cinder Tap. The Iron tap is located lower because the iron is on the bottom. The Blast furnace is presurized @ 18.5 PSI to 40 PSI. The molten iron& slag is suspended on the pocket of air mid furnace. The "Valve man" lowers the pressure and the slag is even with the Cinder tap. There is a brick plug that holds the iron/slag in the furnace. This is drilled out, the clay is injected with the Mud gun plugging the hole..