An analysis accident I experienced
Thread Content
It was probably on December 20, 2006. One of our analysts was analyzing p-nitro compounds, and she used an electric furnace to heat the materials. At some point, the section chief asked her to do other tasks, and she forgot to turn off the furnace. Half an hour later, the fume hood caught fire (it was made of wood). The entire analysis room is on the 5th floor, and there was a lot of smoke, which alerted the factory’s fire department. Thinking back on it now, it’s really scary. Improvement measures: 1. Strengthen supervision of live operations. 2. Replace electric furnaces with heating plates to avoid open flames. 3. Conduct regular safety training sessions. Everyone is welcome to share their experiences and solutions regarding the analyzed accidents
A couple of days ago, I heated the beaker directly with an electric stove and ended up cracking it! We’ll have to use asbestos mesh from now on! Lesson!
Last month, while conducting microbial tests and using devices such as an electric furnace, an incubator, and a high-pressure steam sterilizer at the same time, the excessive load caused the wiring to overheat, melt, and short-circuit. Later, electrical technicians were called in to connect the high-pressure steam sterilizer separately, in order to prevent such issues from occurring again
When preparing the sulfuric acid-silver sulfate solution, in order to accelerate the dissolution process, I placed a 1-liter beaker containing about 800 ml of concentrated sulfuric acid on an electric heater. Unexpectedly, the bottom of the beaker cracked while it was being heated; immediately, thick smoke containing toxic sulfur dioxide filled the entire room, making it impossible to stay there. I turned off the heater and ran outside, and only after the smoke had dissipated did I go back in to deal with the situation.
When I first started working in the analysis lab, there was once an incident where I couldn’t open the stopper of an iodometric flask – this was because, in our analysis process, we first heat the solution in an electric furnace for an hour, then add iodine, and only afterwards close the stopper; I added the iodine and closed the stopper without waiting for the temperature inside the flask to drop. So I placed the flask back on the electric furnace for further heating, and since there was an asbestos mesh on the furnace, this caused the iodometric flask to break, with glass shards flying everywhere; two of those shards even cut my hands. Even thinking about it now, I find it ridiculous from back then.
It’s considered a minor accident... It would be more troublesome if there was a chemical reaction
When using an electric furnace to heat items, it is best not to leave it unattended; if high temperatures are not required, an electric heating plate can be used instead.
Each of our laboratories has a safety officer who signs a responsibility statement every year. Anyone entering this laboratory must have the permission of the person in charge.
Lab work cannot be taken lightly! If you need to attend to other matters while conducting an experiment, it’s best to inform your colleagues; having someone watch over things can help prevent accidents! Also, it’s necessary to follow the operating procedures; violating them will definitely lead to problems!
When I was testing the moisture content in the oil, I accidentally poured the oil on the alcohol lamp, and it immediately caught fire. I was terrified and didn’t know what to do; in my panic, I saw the dry powder fire extinguisher by the door and used it. It took some time to put out the fire. Later, when the team leader arrived, he saw what I had done and said that a wet cloth would have been enough to extinguish the fire. He said I was pretty clever for knowing how to use a fire extinguisher as well. After this incident, I learned that one must be careful, keep learning and asking questions, not be afraid in case of accidents, and stay calm.
It is best for laboratories to avoid open flames and use electric hot plates instead of electric furnaces. Be slow when preparing sulfuric acid! ~! Cooling: Here, the circuits age over time, and power outages occur during experiments. It caused the exhaust fans to stop working; there was a huge amount of smoke that filled the entire laboratory. This situation is harmful to people’s health, and it deserves everyone’s attention
Special care is required when using an electric furnace. I used to think it was fine to heat beakers directly, but once, while preparing a formalin solution using polyformaldehyde, I placed a 5000 mL beaker directly on the electric furnace for heating; I stood nearby stirring it. After some time, the beaker broke, and the formalin solution spilled out – it was highly concentrated and hot, which caused my eyes to water immediately. Everyone in the laboratory was also affected by the fumes. Later, we turned on all the exhaust fans and fume hoods, and used mops to soak up and clean up the formalin; yet the smell remained strong even the next day. After that, my nose became very sensitive to formaldehyde.
Using an electric stove is indeed unsafe. I remember doing organic experiments in the university laboratory; at worst, we used gas lamps. Later, water baths were used for heating, with contact thermometers to control the temperature. After starting work in a company and conducting pilot tests, we generally used electric stoves for heating, but the heating elements of those stoves were of poor quality and often burned out. Eventually, electric heat mantles were used for heating and maintaining temperature.
The pipe of the distilled water machine broke, and steam almost injured someone
Still, strengthening staff training is the most important thing.
The heating element of the distilled water maker often gets damaged; be sure to follow the usage guidelines for electrical equipment. Use electricity safely
Before the New Year, a senior in my lab was drying organic substances in an oven, and a fire broke out; she was so scared that her voice trembled. Fortunately, we managed to put out the fire together using sand. It took a long time to clean the sand and dirt out of the oven afterwards.
Real case: This is something I heard from a retired engineer at the Beijing Institute of Mining Research. It goes that when they first started working there (probably in the 1970s), one of their colleagues was conducting experiments with cyanide. He left his water cup on the lab table, and because he was so focused on the experiment, he ended up drinking the cyanide mistaking it for water. He died on the way to the hospital... Be extremely careful when doing experiments……
The concentrated sulfuric acid we use requires a nitrate content of less than 0.00002%; the batch of reagent grade acid we purchased does not meet this requirement. What should we do? In the end, the supervisor decided to carry out heating distillation in the laboratory to remove nitric acid. Unfortunately, one of the colleagues accidentally added a few drops of water, which caused the entire beaker to boil and liquid to splash everywhere, resulting in burns to one person’s face and hands. Later on, all the female colleagues in the laboratory developed a phobia of sulfuric acid; they wouldn’t dare to touch anything related to its use.
We do the same, but we use circuit breakers; if the heating element gets damaged, it will cause the circuit breaker to trip immediately. Last time, a colleague didn’t realize that the coil had been damaged; as soon as he turned on the circuit breaker, it immediately tripped with a snap, and sparks were also emitted, which scared him so much that he cried out for help, haha
Safety accidents generally occur due to employees' weak safety awareness, lack of basic safety knowledge, and violation of safety operating procedures. To avoid safety operation accidents, it is necessary to strengthen safety education and training, reinforce safety responsibility systems, raise employees’ safety awareness, and strictly enforce safety operation procedures.