Thursday, June 14, 2007

Liquid food transported in tank trucks [some of the KASHRUS concerns]




In the Pesach 5758 issue of Bnei-Torah Newsletter the following issue was addressed.

The tank trucks that transport liquid food product get washed in a commercial "wash-rack. The washing cycle has a pre-wash that removes the food product residue that is remaining in the tanker. Plain (no-detergent) water is recirculated at 180 F through a spray-ball that is inserted into the top of the tanker.

The pre-wash water is actually re-used water from previous trucks that likely have transported non-kosher product. The rational being, it's only to clean out the residue. The tanker has now become non-kosher "ben yomoi" by the pre-wash (190 F) hot water that was spray-balled into the tanker.

There are so called "designated-tankers" that only transport kosher product, that become non-kosher after passing through the wash-rack. The rest of the washing cycle is not suffecient to kosherize the "ben-yomoi" tanker.

At times product is filled hot or remains in the tanker 24 hours (kovush). Some tankers have heating coils which make them a kli-rishon.

Some tankers will not do a complete washout in between similiar loads. A parve chocolate without a cleanout may follow a dairy chocolate load, which may also be an alergen concern.


In order not to go back empty, truckers will "back-haul" another load unbeknown to the transport Company. That load may very well be a non-kosher load in a "designated-tanker".

Other Companies insist that there are seals put on in order to prevent back-hauilng. The driver in order to make a few extra dollars will fake putting on the seals, which will be put on after the back-haul is unloaded.

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