Unshelved by Bill Barnes and Gene Ambaum
comic strip overdue media

Wednesday, September 08, 2010

Hands on learning

Fire in Chemistry-Physics Building

From now on, students in one lab will remember that water causes ignited sodium hydride to flash. Isopropanol is the recommended agent for putting out the fire. Fortunately no one was hurt.

Back in the day, when I was very much a chemistry geek (I took 2 years of it in high school, a summer's worth of organic, and missed bypassing two semesters of introductory chemistry in college plus the lab by something like 3 points on a test), I remember a fire in our lab. Someone (well, I do remember who, but won't name names) had left their experiment involving napthalene running and had gone to get a coke or something. The teacher was talking to a textbook salesman in the next room. There was a pop and then burning fumes and little flakes of naptha sediment floating about. I ran over with the fire blanket, which was instinctual but not useful, as we were talking a ring assembly. I then looked carefully, turned off the bunsen burner and blew out the fire on the fumes. I then calmly walked next door to tell the teacher, and apparently one look at my face and he went running. No harm done. But I remember those moments in excruciating detail, as if time slowed. And to date this somewhat, music was playing from a radio, and it happened to be the Talking Heads' 'Burning Down the House'. :)

Ah, good times. My point is the kids in this lab will probably remember the incident well due to the burst of adrenaline. I wonder if they had music playing, and if so, what?

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