Text/Reporter Zhao Tianyu New Media Editor/Chen Xuanzhi
On the morning of February 26th, 65438, in the laboratory of the East Campus of Beijing Jiaotong University, after a violent explosion, the hearts of three students stopped beating forever.
On the same day, an explosion occurred in the laboratory of Building 2, East Campus of Beijing Jiaotong University, killing three students. According to the news released by the fire department, the accident occurred when students from the municipal environmental engineering department of Beijing Jiaotong University conducted scientific research experiments on landfill leachate sewage treatment in the environmental engineering laboratory of Building 2 in the East Campus.
"Dedication to science" is actually a regrettable result for college students. As the most frequently used scientific experimental site, in recent years, the safety accidents of scientific research laboratories in colleges and universities are common, especially the chemistry laboratory, which has become the "hardest hit" for experimental safety.
Peking University Tsinghua "no one is spared"
The reporter of "Beijing Science and Technology News" briefly combed the explosion accidents of university laboratories reported by the media in recent years. The results show that from 2009, only from the public reports of the media, we can know that there are laboratory safety accidents every year, while Peking University, Tsinghua and other famous schools are "all spared".
20 15 12 18 An explosion occurred in the laboratory of Tsinghua University Department of Chemistry. A doctoral student was confirmed dead after an explosion while doing a chemical experiment with hydrogen in the laboratory. After the incident, the Department of Chemistry of Tsinghua University designated 65438+February 18 as the safety education day every year, and stated that "safety always comes first".
▲ On the morning of 20151218, a fire and explosion accident occurred in Hetian Building, Department of Chemistry, Tsinghua University, killing an experimenter.
20 12 On March 6th, a fire broke out in the experimental building of peking university health science center Center, which is located in the southeast of Ponte dell'Accademia in the North Fourth Ring Road. Fortunately, there were no casualties, but smoke filled the whole building, and many people trapped in the building were evacuated from the second floor platform of the third floor window. At about 7: 30 am on June 3 of the same year, a fire broke out in an experimental building in Peking University, and firefighters arrived in time to put it out. Fortunately, there is no one in the building. Within a year, Peking University experienced two laboratory safety accidents.
In addition to Peking University's Tsinghua, some key universities, especially science and engineering schools, have also had chemical laboratory safety accidents: on the evening of October 23rd, 2009 1, an explosion occurred in a laboratory in the new building No.5 of Beijing Institute of Technology, causing five injuries, including 1 laboratory teacher, two students and two equipment debugging engineers. 2011April 14 15: 45, in the first experimental building of Jiang' an campus of Sichuan University, three students were doing atmospheric fluidized bed coating experiment, and the experimental materials exploded unexpectedly, resulting in three students being injured.
The latest news about "explosion of university laboratory" also comes from Beijing-a fire broke out in the first laboratory of beijing university of chemical technology Science and Technology Building at noon on June 0, 2006. Fortunately, there were no casualties at the scene.
Many reasons lead to safety accidents.
As a teaching school, similar laboratory explosion accidents often cause irreparable losses to the school and society. Scientific research experiments, especially chemical experiments, are inherently risky, and the mistakes of experimenters, the failure or aging of experimental equipment and even the weather may bring very serious consequences.
Subjectively speaking, many laboratory accidents are caused by students who participated in the experiment not following the process norms, or by disorder and operational errors. For example, when preparing solution, water is poured into concentrated sulfuric acid by mistake, or when preparing concentrated sodium hydroxide, the cork stops shaking without cooling as required, which often leads to explosion.
▲ In 2009, an explosion occurred on the 9th floor of No.5 teaching building of Beijing Institute of Technology, causing 1 teacher, 2 students and 2 personnel of an equipment company to be injured.
In the first ten days of June, 20 10, an equipment explosion occurred in a university laboratory. After inflation, the students who participated in the experiment left the laboratory to do other things on the second floor without closing the main valve and pressure reducing valve of the nitrogen cylinder. When he returned to the laboratory and closed the main valve and pressure reducing valve, he returned to the instrument, which exploded immediately. The investigation results after the event showed that the pressure in the instrument was too high due to long-term gas flushing, and the glass of the observation window burst because it could not bear this high pressure, which was the main reason for the accident.
Objectively speaking, laboratory accidents caused by equipment aging, equipment failure or other reasons can not be ignored: all kinds of electrical equipment often produce sparks when switching and short-circuiting, and it is easy to cause fire after contact with combustible gas. After the experiment, if you don't unplug the socket or turn off the power supply, it will also cause a fire.
For example, in mid-June, 5438+February, 2009, the refrigerator in the chemistry laboratory of an academician of a domestic university exploded and caught fire. Fortunately, the rescue was timely and did not cause great losses. Afterwards, it was found out that this was because the refrigerator in the laboratory was very old, and the flammable solvent in the refrigerator exploded after the circuit failed.
Based on the analysis of 95 laboratory accidents in domestic and foreign universities (66 in Chinese mainland universities) from 20 10 to 20 15, a similar conclusion is drawn: explosion and fire account for 68%, leakage accounts for 12%, biological safety accounts for 1 1%. The main causes of safety accidents are also violation of experimental operating rules or careless experimental operation, accounting for 52% of the total number of accidents, resulting in 40% deaths and 65% injuries or poisoning.
Training is more important than experiment.
Throughout the physical and chemical experiments in human history, safety and risk have always been unavoidable topics, and many scientists have suffered big losses-Madame Curie was injured while doing experiments; In order to study explosives, Nobel experienced numerous explosion accidents and even lost his relatives.
Teacher Sun, who is studying chemistry at the university, told the reporter that taking chemical experiments as an example, chemical experiments are dangerous, because most organic reagents are flammable, and it is very easy to catch fire or even explode due to improper operation, but the experiments are only exploratory, and some relatively irregular operations are inevitable.
For example, when the organic solvent is heated by naked flame, if zeolite is forgotten to be added in the reflux or distillation operation, it may cause boiling burns or direct explosion; For example, when taking or dumping organic liquid, it is accidentally spilled out of the bottle, which may detonate instantly in case of an open flame; Some gases are poisonous. Even if it does not explode, it will be "poisoned" if it is not handled properly, such as the famous "chlorine gas" in the book.
Teacher Sun said that it is precisely because of the danger of the laboratory that the school will carry out relevant training before chemical experiments, especially dangerous experiments, and repeatedly emphasize safety. As far as their school is concerned, although there have been no serious casualties like explosions, there have been some minor accidents. "So I killed myself and quit chemistry, so I had to make money and risk my life."
Liu, an associate professor in the Department of Applied Chemistry, School of Food Science, Beijing Technology and Business University, said in an interview that there have been some laboratory safety accidents in domestic universities in recent years, but generally speaking, the number is not large, and there is no deliberate concealment. There are potential safety hazards and even accidents during the experiment, which are related to the experimental contents and materials, so it is difficult to judge the specific reasons for the explosion in Jiaotong University laboratory.
▲ For the safety of experiments, colleges and universities will conduct safety training and formulate strict rules and regulations before chemical experiments. The picture shows the analytical chemistry laboratory of a university.
However, Liu Ye stressed that taking Beijing Technology and Business University as an example, the school attaches great importance to laboratory safety, and in order to ensure the safe development of experiments, teachers and students participating in the courses will be trained regularly. This kind of training is not a cursory explanation, nor is it once or twice, but a systematic course, even more important than the experiment itself.
In fact, the Ministry of Education and the provincial and municipal education authorities organize special personnel to conduct safety inspections on scientific research laboratories in colleges and universities every year, and even set up joint investigation teams when necessary. At the same time, it also requires university laboratories to carry out self-examination and rectification, with the aim of promoting the implementation of safety responsibilities and preventive measures, and preventing and containing all kinds of safety accidents.
Produced by: Popular Science Central Kitchen
Producer: Beijing Science and Technology News | Science Plus Client
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