Metallophile
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Radiophobia?
Is Uranium glazed dishware actually dangerous?
High School evacuated after student brings uranium-glazed plate
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unionised
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Only if it hits you really hard.
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phlogiston
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| Quote: | | "Right away I just wanted the kids to be safe," Bonuomo said when asked about her reaction. "I don't want the kids ever to think they're not safe."
She also thought of her family and her husband, but, she said, "I knew we were going to be OK |
Ironically, their extreme overreaction probably made the kids feel a lot more unsafe than warranted.
They should have used the opportunity to teach kids about radioactivity. I'm assuming some of the teachers at that school teach physics. The
overreaction is a pretty sad indicator of the level of knowledge of the teachers there.
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"If a rocket goes up, who cares where it comes down, that's not my concern said Wernher von Braun" - Tom Lehrer |
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Texium
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So ridiculous. My high school chemistry teacher brought in her own Fiestaware plates to show to the class.
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Fyndium
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I'm not sure where this madness leads into. In 20 years, we see reactions into things that we just purely laugh even at today's standards.
It appears that even the hazmat guys don't have knowledge about hazardous materials, hence they consider all materials hazardous and destroy them just
in case.
Like said in another topic, sodium carbonate has an irritant sign on it, hence being hazardous material.
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aromaticfanatic
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Jesus Christ, I am very conscious about chemicals (my biggest thing is contamination of other surfaces) and probably could be considered to have a
small bit of chemophobia but this is just ridiculous. They made it seem like he brought an angry vial of phosgene into class or something. Pure
insanity.
Oh and to answer the question, as long as you're not inhaling the dust from the broken glass or eat off of the glass (you probably could eat off of it
but if you scratch the glass and create some powder you would ingest that powder, likely not enough to do much but you just generally want to avoid
what you can) then you would be perfectly fine.
[Edited on 11-1-2021 by aromaticfanatic]
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Twospoons
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Do you supposed they've checked for Americium based smoke detectors yet?
Helicopter: "helico" -> spiral, "pter" -> with wings
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ShotBored
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This actually made me lol. I needed it this morning. Thank you sir.
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MadHatter
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Laughable
That's my opinion of this paranoia.
In 1970 we used uranium glazes
for pottery in 7th grade art class.
From opening of NCIS New Orleans - It goes a BOOM ! BOOM ! BOOM ! MUHAHAHAHAHAHAHA !
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Texium
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Worth clarifying though, this was in 2013, so there are still some good chemistry teachers out there even though hysteria
surrounding chemicals has been becoming more common. Don't lose all faith.
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aromaticfanatic
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On another note, I attended an NHS (worthless organization in my opinion, too many people in it) induction and a kid wore goggles..... to light a
plain candle.... I have no idea if this was an attempt at being humorous as he didn't wear the goggles when he lit other candles but it made me cringe
to the depths of my soul. The entire "show" they put on was the most uncomfortable thing I have ever sat through. I do not recommend it. I was in fact
so zoned out listening to mind numbing speeches and acts of humiliation that the curtain behind them began slowly moving in a wave like pattern.
Amazing how boredom and cringe can simulate psychedelics huh?
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Xanax
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This is ridiculously!
In the 90th'ies (when I was about 13-14 years old), I took a jar to my school, filled with Am-241 from multiple smoke-detctors, to see if it really
was radioactive, by using the schools geigercounter. The teachers were interested and showed me some other radioactive materials (I think it was
Radium-226, Caesium-137, Strontium-90 and som uranium-ore.
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Dr.Bob
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I remember playing with liquid mercury at school, and even having a science demo where the person froze some mercury on the end of a stick and used it
as a hammer to drive a nail and then allowed the hammer to melt into a jar. In college we did a dripping mercury electrode experiment with buckets
of mercury being poured into a sep funnel that dripped it through the electrode. Not to say that was really safe, but I think I turned out pretty
well.
So while I would not go to those extremes, I think just being reasonably cautious is fine, we don;t need to have paranoia about benzene, mercury, etc
to the degree that some places do now. If our waste water has one part per trillion of mercury in it, they have a panic attack, but that is about
what you generate after eating a tuna fish sandwich and flushing the toilet. Traces of uranium glaze are not likely to be a real hazard unless you
are eating the dishes.
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phlogiston
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Once a year, we had a special day about radioactivity in physics class in our high school, on which the kids in the second grade could do little
experiments with radioactive sources. Measure the half life of radon-220. Measure the penetration depths of radiation from an alpha, beta and gamma
source. Identify an isotope using a gamma spectrometer. Things like that. In hindsight it was pretty cool and interesting that we had that.
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"If a rocket goes up, who cares where it comes down, that's not my concern said Wernher von Braun" - Tom Lehrer |
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BJ68
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Okay....few years ago I had mail contact with the officer-in-charge of a fire department and asked him why they had a large scale operation at a
school (academic high school = Gymnasium).
The case: One teacher dropped one bottle with 200 ml 1% Sudan III solution in isopropyl alcohol at the room of the "Biologie-Sammlung". She called the
fire department of the city and as they come she said that it was a carcinogenic liquid. There where rebuilding measures at the room, so it was not
possible to look at the MSDS. From this the officer-in-charge decided to put the highest protection level in charge.....180 students where evacuated,
three emergency doctors, ten paramedics, forty-four firemen and ten police officer where alarmed. People with chemical protection suits and heavy
breathing protection where on the scene and four teacher where send to the hospital for checkups.
In the mailing with the officer-in-charge, he said that the statements of the teacher where true for the pure substance, but not for the solution. But
even for the solution, the MSDS states that you should use a full protection suit (in case of fire).
I wrote back that even this accident would involve the pure Sudan III powder the case would not so serious....because the amounts are not so big. One
of my critic points where that the MSDS have the industrial level in mind...there is a big difference if a bottle with 500 g breaks or one 200 kg drum
drops from the truck.
The answer at this mail was interesting:
He said that he is in charge (responsible) and has to make decisions in seconds or minutes and he agrees to my sophisticated perspective
(differenzierten Sichtweise), but he made the experience that "The Press" and in this case perhaps concerned parents have not the same opinion.
From this description for me is clear that "The Press" and the parents have a big part of this hysteria and from the point of the officer-in-charge I
can understand that this guys are more at "Rather too much than too little"....because nobody likes it if his bottom is roasted, plus in the US this
"fun" (if you take responsibility and do not make this big measures) can be expensive if you get fined.
bj68
[Edited on 14-5-2021 by BJ68]
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