From sci.chem Thu Nov 14 17:22:38 1996
From: U.SCHATZSCHNEIDER@NADESHDA.gun.de (Ulrich Schatzschneider)
Newsgroups: sci.chem
Subject: Re: Lab Accidents.......
Date: 11 Nov 96 00:00:00 GMT
X-ZC-Post: Duesseldorf; NRW; Germany

Hi out there,

last year, we had a guy in our organics lab who decided to grind LAH  
(Lithiumaluminiumhydrid) delivered as pellets (about a centimeter in  
diameter). Well, don't do that ....

Luckily nobody was injured by the explosion, but the equipement he used  
was torn into pieces (shit, what's the english name of the thing you use  
to grind solids in the lab ?) and the LAH was spread in the whole lab as  
fine dust. Well, that was what he originally wanted, but only in his  
reaction flask ;-)

So be careful with these hydrids. Only last week we also had a small  
accident when somebody washed a dropping funnel (right word ?) with water  
he used do add LiH in some kind of solvent to his reaction mixture before.  
Well, he did wash it with iPrOH before, but acutally not good enough.  
Looked like starting a flame-thrower ...

Yours,

Ulrich Schatzschneider