An Eruption Caused by Zinc and Sulfur

The sun was risen upon the earth when Lot came unto Zoar. Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven and he overthrew those cities and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew upon the ground. But his wife looked back from behind him, and she became a pillar of salt. And Abraham gat up early in the morning to the place where he had stood before the Lord and he looked toward Sodom and Gomorrah, and toward all the land of the plain, and beheld, and, lo, the smoke of the land went up as the smoke of a furnace. 

Porcelain spoon, 100-mL beaker, gas burner, knitting needle, metal support about 50 X 50 cm, large watchglass, safety glasses, protective gloves. 

Zinc reacts with sulfur in a strongly exothermic reaction to form zinc sulfide and with oxygen to give zinc oxide the latter is yellow when hot but becomes white on cooling (tbermochromism). 

The reaction products are transferred to the container used for collecting less toxic inorganic waste. 

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