The Day Leon Sheets' World Went 'Boom'
It was Sept. 15, 2014, a day that should have been normal for Leon Sheets, a pork producer from Ionia, Iowa. It turned out to be anything but normal. Somewhere between checking on the barn and taking a moment to wet the pen, something went wrong.
“I was only power washing,” he explained. “I was only rinsing the pens.”
“My world went boom,” he told the audience, pausing a moment. “Actually, it went BOOM.”
A fireball estimated at 400 degrees Fahrenheit surrounded Sheets instantly. The blast left his glasses charred, the plastic edges crystallized. His polyester coveralls, with a melting point of roughly 280 degrees Fahrenheit, melted to his back. Second- and third-degree burns covered 20 percent of Sheets’ body.
