Why Scary Lab Accidents Happen

About 10 to 50 times more lab accidents occur in schools and universities than in industry.

Enrico Uva, Science 2.0

If a chemist has never been in a lab accident, he has been lucky. Of course luck is more likely to come to those whose mentors have learned from bad experiences and to those who have taken preventive measures seriously, despite their anal nature. Chemical reactions create products with behaviors that differ from those of the ingredients. That's what makes them intriguing, and it's also what makes them potentially dangerous. No matter how simple and controllable a reaction seems on paper, when it's carried out in real life, the exact conditions determine its rate. And when gases or acids acquire too much kinetic energy, no one wants eyes, lungs and flesh in their way.

UCLA Professor Arraigned in Fatal Accident

LA Times

A Los Angeles County Superior Court judge entered a not guilty plea Wednesday on behalf of a UCLA chemistry professor arraigned on felony charges in a 2008 laboratory fire that killed a staff research assistant.

Judge Shelly Torrealba also set a preliminary hearing on Oct. 9 for professor Patrick Harran, who is charged with three counts of willfully violating state occupational health and safety standards.

Exploding Experiment, No Injuries

UC Davis Report

Failure to maintain equipment properly has apparently resulted in another academic lab safety incident, but one that, fortunately, caused no injuries, reports Jyllian Kemsley at Chemical & Engineering News. On 23 January, undergraduates in a physical chemistry class at the University of California, Davis, were working with a piece of equipment called a bomb calorimeter when it exploded. (Despite its name, that is not supposed to happen.) The lid of the metal instrument was "forcibly propelled upward" until it hit the ceiling and other metal fragments and pieces of a mercury thermometer were sprayed into the room, according to a report on the event by a university chemical hygiene officer.

Fire in Chemistry Lab Cancels Classes & Sends Students Home

wwnytv.com

After a fire at a science lab on Friday February 10th, class at SUNY Canton were cancelled until Monday February 20th. Black smoke was seen coming from Cook Hall, which caused the campus to be closed and activities cancelled. Significant damaged was caused to the lab. No one was injured in the fire; however, and currently the cause of the fire is unknown. 

Two stories are available BELOW, both with video.

School District Chemicals Audit Reaches End

By: Cathyrn Creno, Arizona Republic News

WV DEP

After the Arizona Fire Marshal’s Office wrote up Mesa High School during the first week of school for improper storage and identification of chemicals on campus, the district is nearing completion of a comprehensive effort to identify and log thousands of chemicals in Mesa’s 84 schools.

The district is entering the names, amounts and expiration dates of the substances into a database that can be accessed by school officials and outside emergency workers. Officials also are creating a comprehensive safety training program for everyone who handles chemicals in the district — from custodians to chemistry teachers.

Building Evacuated - One Injured

From: The Daily Cardinal

www.chemicallabels.com/

Biochemistry building evacuated, one injured after chemical spill
A hazardous materials crew, police officers, ambulances and fire trucks responded to a chemical spill in a UW-Madison biochemistry laboratory after a graduate student spilled a highly flammable solvent, injuring one person.

According to a graduate student in the Biochemistry building, the student spilled about 40 liters of tetrahydrofuran (THF), a chemical that can dissolve a wide range of materials including latex gloves, flooring and other plastics, in the Ronald Raines laboratory between 10:15 and 10:45 a.m.

UCLA 2009 Incident - Felony Charges

Sangji's lab notebook reveals that she

planned to react vinyl bromide with

tert-butyllithium as the first step of a

larger synthesis. ACS

Below are articles reviewing the most recent information on the investigation.

Los Angeles Times

Felony charges filed against UC and a UCLA chemistry professor after fatal laboratory fire

A research assistant was fatally burned when chemicals burst into flame. Her death three years ago has focused attention on safety issues.

December 28, 2011

4 Students Burned at Junior High

By: CBS Minnesota

My Fox 9

MAPLE GROVE, Minn. (WCCO) — Four students were transported to the Hennepin County Medical Center for burns after a methanol experiment blew up at Maple Grove Junior High. All the students, ninth graders, are currently in satisfactory condition. The experiment was being conducted by their ninth grade science teacher. Authorities say he was performing an experiment with a flammable liquid when the accident happened. It is not clear if the students suffered chemical burns or were burned by fire.

A fifteen-year-old got the worst of it and was still being treated at HCMC Thursday afternoon. “My face was actually on fire,” he said. 

Picric Acid Leads to Evacuation at School

By: Hilary Lane WKTV

Photo Credit HERE.

WATERVILLE, N.Y. (WKTV) - Students and staff members at Waterville Junior and Senior High School were evacuated a little after Noon on Thursday the New York State Police Bomb Disposal Unit out of Albany was called in to assess and dispose of some potentially hazardous chemicals.

"We are concerned about one of the chemicals that is possibly dangerous and could call an explosion," says Gary Lonczak, superintendent of schools. The main issue is a bottle of picric acid which is over 25 years old.

Teen Hospitalized from Science Explosion

By: Meg Alexander KFOR-TV

KFOR-TV

DEL CITY, Okla. -- An eighth grader has burns on her face, neck and hands after a school scientific demonstration went wrong at Kerr Middle School. "We were watching and she put the chemicals in and it exploded and hit me. I remember seeing the fire and I went on the ground and my friends were putting me out."

She's worried about long-term scarring and discoloration. The pain, especially at night, is hard to withstand. Her parents say they don't understand how this happened. Ashley told them they weren't wearing goggles.

Students Poisoned by Pesticides

By: eNews Park Forest!

Greg Lynch, Dayton Daily News

Washington, DC--(ENEWSPF)--October 27, 2011.  Forty-seven students from Edgewood Middle School in St. Clair Township, Ohio, reportedly fell ill after the school’s hired pest control company sprayed the herbicide Momentum, which contains the toxic ingredients 2,4-D, triclopyr and clopyralid, on nearby playing fields to treat for clover and other weeds. The incident and others like it demonstrate the need for a comprehensive national policy to protect children from harmful and unnecessary exposure to toxic chemicals. Six students were taken to nearby hospitals and twenty-one students total were treated for symptoms, including headaches, breathing difficulties, nausea and dizziness.

6 Students Injured in Chemistry Lab

By: Nancy McCleary

Staff photo by Amanda Berg

Six students were treated for injuries after a chemistry experiment at E.E. Smith High School went awry Tuesday afternoon, officials said. Three of the students were taken to Cape Fear Valley Medical Center, said Theresa Perry, a school system spokeswoman. Two were being treated for minor burns, she said. The third student and three others who were tended to at the school had respiratory-related issues, said Ron Lewis, a battalion commander with the Fayetteville Fire Department.

Academic Lab Safety Under Examination

Chemical safety board report probes academic research practices, identifies role for American Chemical Society (ACS )

From: Chemical & Engineering News

By: Jeff Johnson And Jyllian Kemsley

Source:Texas Tech University

A fire at one university that led to a researcher’s death and an explosion at another that seriously injured a graduate student are among several incidents in the past few years that have turned a spotlight on safety practices in academic chemistry laboratories. 

Since 2001, more than 120 university lab accidents have caused injuries, millions of dollars in damages, and one death, according to the federal Chemical Safety & Hazard Investigation Board (CSB).

OSHA Releases New Lab Safety Materials

From: Occupational Health and Safety Online

OSHA recently published new educational materials for laboratory managers on protecting their workers from exposure to chemical, biological, and physical hazards on the OSHA laboratory safety website.

The new materials include the Laboratory Safety Guidance document, which describes how electrical, fire, explosions, and falls, among other hazards, can be minimized or eliminated if employers use safety plans, worker training, engineering controls, and personal protective equipment. New laboratory safety materials also include fact sheets that each focus on a specific hazard related to laboratory environments. Practices and precautions to protect laboratory personnel include safety guidance for using autoclaves, use of chemical fume hoods, labeling and transferring chemicals, and latex exposure.

Jewelry Studio Incident Sends Student to Hospital

LONGMONT, Colo. -- Authorities say a Front Range Community College student has been taken to a hospital after she suffered burns while diluting a chemical in a jewelry studio classroom.

Longmont emergency manager Dan Eamon tells the Daily Times-Call the woman was injured Saturday by a chemical reaction while she was diluting ferric chloride. The chemical is often used for water treatment and to etch metal.

Hazardous Chemical Misused in a School

By DAVID SEIFMAN City Hall Bureau Chief nypost.com
October 16, 2010

NY Post: G.N. Miller 

Two students created a scare at a middle school in Brooklyn by pouring a potentially dangerous chemical into the hands of unsuspecting classmates -- leading to a hazmat response that included cops and firefighters, officials disclosed yesterday.

Six students from Seth Low IS 96 in Bensonhurst were taken to Coney Island Hospital as a precaution.

Several others were taken to emergency rooms by their parents after Thursday's incident.

Science Lab Incident Sickens Students

By Shawn Raymundo

Salt River Fire Paramedics rushed on to campus after two students in the Natural Science building suffered from breathing complications while working with pure Ethanol on Tuesday Sept. 21.

The three-hour lab, taught by Professor Anne Healy, had been using pure Ethanol, also known as ethyl alcohol or drinking alcohol, when the two girls began to feel nauseous. Classmate, Diane Hannan, said, "they turned red and blush and couldn't breathe."

Early speculation, from administration, over the cause of the incident was

Mercury Brought into Classroom by Student

By Linda Bock TELEGRAM; GAZETTE STAFF
lbock@telegram.com

WORCESTER — Federal environmental officials told school and health officials this morning that the clean-up of the Grafton Elementary Street School is going smoothly, addressing the potentially hazardous mercury that was brought into a classroom by a student on Tuesday.

“That's really good news,” said Worcester schools Chief Academic Officer Jeffrey J. Mulqueen, who was at the school throughout the morning.  A specialized top-to-bottom cleaning of the building is ongoing.

A sixth-grade student brought nearly a pint of mercury to Grafton Street School to show a teacher on Tuesday, and that prompted an environmental investigation.

Despite the optimistic news