Forbidden.
Banned
MATS1101
Engineering Materials and Chemistry
Acid Burn in Chemistry Lab
Engineering Materials and Chemistry
Acid Burn in Chemistry Lab
OK, I was doing the experiment 'Chemistry of Aluminium' where we had to extract Aluminium from soft drink cans.
I was halfway through the experiment where I was up to filtering out the alum from the crystals using the vacuum (which contained sulfate ions from an original 9M H2SO4 solution, 9M!!!!, if it was 18M then it would be worse).
But the tap didn't work, so shortly after that I took the contents of the Hirsh filter and then ...
spilt onto the top surface of my hand and I thought it would burn my hand down to my bone costing me a hand forever!
But instead I felt this stinging sensation all over the top of my hand then rushed over to the nearest tap and wash off the alum crystals with all the potassium and sulfate ions in it as everyone watched in silence.
It was the hot water tap but there wasn't hot water yet and then I just rinsed under the cold water tap then the demonstrator poured some sodium bicarbonate onto my hand.
Then my experiment was aborted then I was escorted to the medical centre on campus and have the doctor check my hand.
Because I washed it off early there wasn't anything major and my hand was rinsed in Sodium Chloride solution then bandaged all over except my fingers and thumb so I now have partial functionality with my left hand.
The doc saw I had dry skin so in the end just prescribed me Zinc and Omega-3 oil tablets.
The bandage should be left for a day and now my hand is fine now, the most important thing is you rinse the acid off immediately with water.
Best of all, I don't have to do the experiment again and the paperwork has been done!
Last edited:
