Bad news for beef ranchers down under - from the Australian Broadcasting Commission:
Genetics laboratory fire in Yarram destroys 100 cryogenic cylinders containing cattle semen
An overnight fire has destroyed 100 valuable cryogenic cylinders containing cattle semen at a genetics laboratory and storage facility at Yarram in south-east Victoria.
The fire in Rodgers Street started about 3:00am and took 10 fire crews more than two hours to contain.
More - from the Fire Commander:
"The liquid inside the cylinders was rapidly expanding and essentially the lids of the cryogenic cylinders were just popping off the top and projectiles were being thrown from the building," he said.
These are dewars containing liquid nitrogen. Not flammable but N2 expands 696 times when it moves from liquid state to gaseous. Builds up a lot of pressure.
The value:
"The actual cylinders are worth between $500 and $1,000 per unit but the semen inside them varies in price," he said.
"We're coming into the AI season so there would have been substantial amounts of semen inside the tanks that we've lost, which was owned by our local farmers, and it can range in value from $5 per straw to $95 per straw.
With each dewar holding maybe 100 straws. Value lost plus the farmers are going to be scrambling to get more for this spring's insemination. It is early spring down there.
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