Various Accidents and Injuries

[WarezWally]

Had my first minor accident in a long time.

 

A few days ago I was measuring some sulphuric acid density, I had 5ml in a graduated cylinder and I left it on my bench as I didn't have anything to neutralize it with. Yesterday I went to pour it into a beaker and spilt a bit on my finger, I could feel the heat instantly - luckily there was a tap 2 seconds away.

 

No damage, I guess it only made its way through a few layers of skin.

 

I should have had gloves on in the first place, I wont make the same mistake twice.

[tentacles]

Just would like to say for everyone's benefit - when handling acids, ALWAYS have a crap-ton of neutralizer on hand and NEARBY in case of accidents.. I bought a 2kg bag of soda ash (mostly sodium carbonate, some bicarb) for this purpose. Very cheap at a pottery place or just get a big - open - box of baking soda. When acid's all over, you do not have time to fumble around opening a box or bag...

 

Glad you weren't hurt, that stuff can be horribly nasty, even diluted.. But concentrated, on damp skin, holy crap!

Edited July 25, 2008 by tentacles

[crazyboy25]

I have a 10Lb bag of bicarb. right next to my acid drawer. I have gotten sulfuric acid on my hands a few times but I only noticed an oily sensation no burning (but i got it off very fast.)

[tentacles]

Crazy: The real problem with H2SO4 is when you get the concentrated stuff on you when you're damp, the moisture mixes with the H2SO4 and now you've got (almost) concentrated H2SO4 that's damn hot on you. If your skin is very dry (and/or oily) it's not too bad but damp... it's just brutal. I'm sure you've mixed it into distilled water before and heard it boiling the water as you pour it in? Imagine that happening on your skin!

[Boomer]

Unless you're dripping with sweat, it's actually not that bad.

 

If you get some on your hand, you have plenty of time to go to the nearest bathroom and wash it off. In fact I sometimes did not even notice it for a minute or so, then it slowly starts to itch. When washing out test tubes with conc. sulfuric, I sometimes close them with my thumb and shake, then pour them out and wash it away.

 

I even do that with H2SO4/H2O2 (piranha mix) sometimes. But beware of HOT sulfuric, which boils at 330C, 150C above molten solder. This stuff literally eats its way through organic matter in seconds, drop it on some leaves and it goes right through. It fulfills the things that are said about piranha fluid. Not like thermite that's rumored to go through an engine block in a blink, when in fact it barely makes it through a centimeter of steel plate.

[flying fish]

As for thermite...I think it depends on how much of it you have, how it is directed, and of course what the engine block is made out of...I believe that most modern engine blocks are made out of aluminum or Magnesium/ Aluminum alloys, right? The engine alloy should have a melting point of around 600C, whereas thermite produces molten Iron at about 2200-2500C. Steel has a melting temperature around 1500C, and the cooling curve might be steep enough from the 2200-2500 such that it would not be able to do much damage to the steel. But the Mg/Al...

 

There was a youtube video demonstrating this...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdCsbZf1_Ng . Looks legitamate, but I bet they had a shitload of it.

[Mumbles]

I think he's talking about the ability to "burn through" an engine block. This is a claim that comes from some of the crap files. The only feasible way I can really see to do this is to use a lot of excess Fe2O3, and actually consume the engine block as fuel. The majority of the heat is projected upwards into the air where there is a much smaller specific heat, so most of it would get bled away.

[WarezWally]

Piranha solution is pretty powerful, I made a small amount using 3% peroxide and it was powerful enough to significantly attack copper.

 

Hot sulphuric acid takes the cake though, that will eat pretty much anything you can find (short of a few plastics (PTFE) and glass)

[oskarchem]

Well, actually, coming back form a chemistry/pyro weekend at a friends house (FlyingDutchman) my bottle of 98% H2SO4 leaked, ans the foil bag it was in was not burned through, wich is quite interesting actually.

[crazyboy25]

Why? Sulfuric acid doesn't react with aluminum.

[Boomer]

He probably means a plastic foil bag. Many strong acids don't attack plastic, and you would expect the manufacturers to choose a plastic that's resistant in case the bottle leaks. That's what the bag is for ...

 

On a side note, I use syringes exclusively for measuring liquids, and they take a lot of abuse considering they cost 10 cent. The only thing that caused them to leak (after some hours) was DCM / chloroform.

[Richtee]

Nothing too serious, not gonna require a Dr. visit. 2nd degree on the meaty part of the thumb/palm size of a silver dollar, 1st's on the back of my pinky thru "F" finger...heh. Ouch!

 

Should have updated. A month and a half... all pretty OK. Still a little tactile dysfunction on the meat of the thumb area, but healed well. Boy I learned a lesson.

[Yankie]

I decided to test some of my BP so I made a small pile and grabbed the nearest flamable stick like object which just happened to be the BBQ skewer I use for mixing water into BP. I held onto the BP covered end and light the other end, then put the glowing tip into the pile of BO. A spark jumped from the fireball and lit the end of the stick I was holding. I got some minor burns on my thumb and forefinger.

how do you classify a 1st degree burn from a 2nd and 3rd?

[Richtee]

how do you classify a 1st degree burn from a 2nd and 3rd?

 

 

First-degree burns affect only the outer layer of the skin. They cause pain, redness, and swelling.

Second-degree (partial thickness) burns affect both the outer and underlying layer of skin. They cause pain, redness, swelling, and blistering.

Third-degree (full thickness) burns extend into deeper tissues. They cause white or blackened, charred skin that may be numb.

[TheSidewinder]

Fredbert: I made a detailed post about burns, and how they are classified, in the First Aid thread. Take a look there.

Generally, if it *doesn't* blister it's a first-degree burn, while if it *does* blisters, it's second-degree. It's unlikely you received a third-degree burn from what you described.

[Pretty green flame]

3rd degree burns generally have little to no pain, mostly because the nerve endings have been completely destroyed so you are unable to feel anything.

[Yankie]

In that case it must be second degree, but only just, I got a little blister.

I almost had another accident today, I lit a peice of flying fish outside and it flew back inside through the door and straight towards over 2kg of bp and star composition. I got lucky because nothing happened. But I have learned from my mistake.

[Swede]

Fredbert, was the BP and stuff exposed? Just like the guy with a garbage bag full of riced BP... comps like that need to be in a reasonably stout container. Even an HDPE bucket could withstand most "stimuli" like a piece of FF fuse.

 

Again, I'll never, ever bash someone who posts a "true confession" with regards to safety. We simply want to take away lessons learned.

 

In the aviation world, we have a mechanism variously called a NASA/ASAP report, whereby if you screw up, by fully disclosing all details, you are granted immunity from any punishment, so long as you did not willfully violate an FAR, the rules that govern commercial flight. This is an excellent mechanism to reveal safety issues that would otherwise be swept under the rug.

 

Since we have no governing body to punish anybody, the reward is a big "Thank you" and immunity from any smart-ass comments.

[Richtee]

Again, I'll never, ever bash someone who posts a "true confession" with regards to safety. We simply want to take away lessons learned.

 

In the aviation world, we have a mechanism variously called a NASA/ASAP report, whereby if you screw up, by fully disclosing all details, you are granted immunity from any punishment, so long as you did not willfully violate an FAR, the rules that govern commercial flight. This is an excellent mechanism to reveal safety issues that would otherwise be swept under the rug.

 

Since we have no governing body to punish anybody, the reward is a big "Thank you" and immunity from any smart-ass comments.

 

VERY good idea. Take note ballbusters... as the worm MAY turn.

[Gunzway]

Argh, Had a small accident which could of ended quite badly.

 

I was testing some stars/lift/rocket smoke mix, just before. All was going good, found out my lift improved a lot after another week of drying and my rocket mix was still good for more use. I just finished testing some D1 and was about to load the TT star on my "testing paver". It is quite windy today, didn't think much of it. I had my containers about 1m-2m back along with me except for one container which contained the stars I was testing. I lit the TT with a piece of black match and retreated back to my other containers to see if it's still in good condition. I was watching it and a spark landed right beside me into my lift. The lift took flames and ignite the stars and my rocket smoke mix. I saw it on fire and immediately turned my back and tried to retreat fast as I can.

Unfortunately I was a bit too late and I received 1st degree burns and 2nd degree burns of the back of my arms.

Not only I lost about 100 stars, 50grams of lift, 100grams of smoke mix, fuse which was also incidentally kept with my stars. I got the hugest puff of smoke blowing towards some people fishing over the river.

This was my biggest concern. But luckily I didn't hear anyone complaining and no fire brigade came rushing over. But now I just wasted a lot of resources, got some minor burns and got a nice molten mass of plastic on my concrete. I normally test one thing at a time and bring only the required amount of test in a separate container to eliminate the chance of this happening.

It just shows you that even for a second you do something different and think nothing of it, somethings can go wrong. I always kind of thought "My black powder wont ignite from a single spark" (It's not really sensitive) but I am glad that I now know how fast a whole pyro workshop can be caught alight.

 

PS. I'm glad I was wearing cotton. (I moved one of the containers which contained the lift into the photo, the lift which was 1m-2m away caught fire not the stars)

[rocket]

It’s surprising how fast things can go wrong, good to hear your ok well semi ok.

 

The wind caught me out today too by blowing some comp I was testing away.

[Swede]

Gunzway, good lesson learned. It's amazing how far a cinder can travel. I think just about everyone would have a small supply of test items like you did nearby. Maybe staying upwind on a windy day would help. Even better would be to minimize the material on hand, and keep it in a covered container. A 2 1/2 or 5 gallon HDPE bucket could be used as a tote. Inside the bucket are cups with the comps, stars, etc. The lid doesn't even need to be hammered down, just placed on top, and a stray cinder or spark is not going to melt through the HDPE.

 

I'm glad you weren't hurt worse. Thanks for the warning.

[Yankie]

With my Flying Fish incident I think I got lucky because everything was in containers. Just cheap plastic ones but they saved a lot of mess.

$2 for 6 at the cheap shop, best investment

[Pretty green flame]

Had an accident today, I was testing some Meal n' Metal stars, I lit a 10mm Meal/Magnalium stars, I stepped back about 1 meter and waited for the fuse to light the stars, when it touched it off the star shot up into the air hitting me in the face, thank god I had my polycarbonate face shield on, scared the shit outta me.

 

And to be honest, this was the the first time I put my face shield on for testing stars, don't know what made me put it up but I sure as hell am grateful.

[Mumbles]

Sometimes you just have that gut instinct.