First time poster here. This was one of the scariest days of my life.
Some needed info: This one's from way back to my high-school years. I was 3rd year when this happened. My school is an old private school which is literally located smacked in the middle of a jungle. It takes literally 15-20 minute drive to the town.
We all have had those Science projects right? So on my 3rd year of high-school, I decided to do something ambitious. It was pretty much an attempt to collect native plants from my area and see if they have any potential as a bio-fuel source. I also wanted to work alone because I just wanted to.
Initially, everything was going smoothly as according to plan. My proposal was approved, the school gave me permission to use the lab after class hours, I had access to some chemicals that were hard to come-by, and I got help with collecting the different plant samples.
So pretty much, the process involves me "extracting" any fuel components from plant matter using a chemical called N-HEXANE. It pretty much acts as a co-solvent. To spare you any of the rather deeper details, it involved usage heat while mixing in the N-HEXANE. My school's chem lab was a separate building from the main campus.
My first few weeks were great. Some plants barely produced anything while there were some promising ones. On a chill Tuesday afternoon though, I attempted to continue my project groggy and lacking some sleep. Spent the night before playing Left 4 Dead and Civ 4 with friends. That was were I made my first mistake. I proceeded to do the ritual cleaning of equipment, setting up the distillation stuff (you know, the works), and preparing the plant samples.
Everything was going fine up until the point I needed to add the N-HEXANE to the plant now crushed plant mass. The plant mass was inside a flask that was being heated over a bunsen burner. Stupid sleepy me forgot to prepare the N-HEXANE which was kept nicely in chilled cabinet/refrigerator thingy, so I immediately rushed to grab it, pour a few ml to a small beaker, and pour it into the flask.
That's were I made my second mistake. What happens when you have a heated piece of glass that gets subjected to something cold? Yup. It shatters. And boy did it shatter like the 4th of fucking July. The moment the glass broke, the plant mass and the N-HEXANE immediately caught fire. Pieces of glass hit dug into my skin with some hitting sinking deep into my face. Thankfully I had goggles so my eyes were spared. That wasn't the worst part though. The fire that erupted outward had burnt my hair and areas of my face. I fell down to the ground and the whole table was on fire.
I tried to quickly get up by grabbing onto the table and pulling myself up. Third mistake. There was shattered glass on the table and it cut through my glove and straight into my right hand. I panicked like there was no tomorrow and in the process, I hit the bunsen burner and it disconnects the rubber hose from it. Fire quickly jumped onto the streaming gas. The main pipes that supplied gas started bursting with fire. That's when I knew I was really fucked. I just got down and took cover under the cement lab table I was working on and prayed it'd be alright when suddenly- I heard a loud bang and the lab shook.
I took a few moments before slowly getting up. The school's fire alarm was roaring. I was delirious and in pain. There was huge hole in the very back of the lab. Fire, glass, and rubble was everywhere. Took all my focus just to get out of the building and when I got out, there were security guards all over the place.
Spent the next few weeks recovering and explaining to the school administration what the hell just happened. Thankfully, my family didn't have to pay too much for the damages and all I got was detention. Ended up changing projects to something related to composting and lemons.
TL;DR I shattered a vial of bio-fuel over a roaring Bunsen Burner. It explodes in my face and somehow causes the fire to travel up and blow the main gas tank outside the lab.
Submitted November 24, 2016 at 06:52PM by Manxellion http://ift.tt/2fs8n3h tifu
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