labguy.gif Lessons Home

Discovery of an Old Container of Potentially Explosive Chemical

What happened?
While working in a UC Berkeley laboratory, a graduate student discovered the presence of an old experimental set-up, which was labeled as containing a small amount of hydrazoic acid, in a shared cold room with no responsible contact person. This material is a potentially explosive chemical under certain circumstances, so the student referred the set-up to the Department Safety Coordinator (DSC). The DSC requested the assistance of EH&S who recommended that the set-up be disposed of by an explosives material contractor because very little was known about the source and nature of the material. The disposal was performed after hours at a significant cost to the department.

Lessons learned from this incident include:
  • Rooms where chemicals and laboratory set-ups are present should be assigned to a responsible person to periodically inspect for safety issues as well as to perform and submit an annual chemical inventory to EH&S.
  • All students who use shared rooms should practice good housekeeping and avoid clutter. Chemicals no longer in use should be disposed of in a timely manner through EH&S.
  • All materials stored in shared rooms should be properly labeled, including information on the user.
Resources
  1. Safe Storage of Hazardous Chemicals Booklet (PDF)
  2. EH&S Fact Sheet - Chemical Inventory
  3. EH&S Fact Sheet - Clutter as a Laboratory Safety Concern (PDF)
  4. Poster – How to Dispose of Unwanted Material at UC Berkeley
uc seal Contact Us | Employment | Feedback | Berkeley Home | ©2009 University of California, Berkeley