April 22, 2013
Five miles north of downtown, a fertilizer plant sits on 29 acres in a mostly uninhabited area near railroad tracks. And just 492 feet away from the steel and gravel is Cesar Chavez Elementary School.
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Theo Udeigwe, assistant professor of chemistry at the Department of Plant and Soil Science at Texas Tech University, said ammonium sulfate, used in a type of fertilizer, "contains ammonia, so there's chances of it being combustible. But not like ammonium nitrate. That one is explosive.''