why is important to follow laboratory safety rules
Answer (1)
A well-stocked laboratory has a wide variety of chemicals and types of equipment. A published procedure is generally a carefully-reviewed plan of how the work should be carried out. Often, one might encounter an instruction that seems needless and a waste of time. One may also be using a chemical that is considered harmful or dangerous. Using certain pieces of equipment can also add to the hazards of a laboratory. Two real-life examples:1) In the synthesis of an organic sulfide, one step states "add the liquid very slowly to the beaker, Do not simply pour it in." If that step is taking a long time, nothing much is happening to the mixture, and lunch is waiting, the temptation to pour more quickly can lead to speeding up the mixing. What's not obvious is that the solution may be heating up, since it is a exothermic reaction. That may not be obvious, so let's pour more quickly.That's exactly what I did one year in school. The resulting fume of hydrogen sulfide cleared out the classroom.2) Don't take shortcuts with the experimental setup. Assembling a distillation apparatus using flasks arranged on a ring stand is a good procedure since all pieces are securely held in place during the distillation, using a Bunsen burner as a source of the heat. It is dangerous not to follow the procedure.The student next to me in a chemistry lab felt the process of assembling the system was too tedious. Against my suggestions, he assembled a distillation system using other materials, where possible. I wasn't paying much attention, until his apparatus fell over and caught fire. The teacher put it out quickly with a fire extinguisher, and I tried hiding my grin over his decision to ignore my advice. You can imagine my surprise when he turned to me and apologized. Well, I thought, he admits he should have listened. BUT . . . his apology was "I'm sorry. I used your books to raise the Bunsen burner. Here they are back - I tied to scrape off the burned areas."Both are true stories. There are steps in a protocol that may not seem important, but often times they are there for an specific (and life-saving) reason.
