Potentially Explosive Combination of Some Common Reagents

APPENDIX 17-2 POTENTIALLY EXPLOSIVE COMBINATION OF SOME COMMON REAGENTS 

Acetone with chloroform in the presence of base Acetylene with copper, silver, mercury, or their salts Ammonia (including aqueous solutions) with CI2, Br2, or I2 Carbon disulfide with sodium azide Chlorine with an alcohol 

Chloroform or carbon tetrachloride with powdered aluminium or magnesium 

Diethyl ether with chlorine (including a chlorine atmosphere) 

Dimethyl sulfoxide with an acyl halide, SOC12, or POC13 or with Cr03 Ethanol with calcium chlorate (I) or silver nitrate (V) 

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Potentially Explosive Combinations of Some Common Reagents... 

Luckily for the laboratory chemist, many of these mishaps of yesteryear have been collated, most notably (and authoritatively) by Leslie Bretherick. Bretherick s Handbook of Reactive Chemical Hazards, which by 2006 had reached its 7th edition, details the predictable and the unexpected from the literature of reactive chemical hazards. In a review, published in Hazards in the Chemical Laboratory, 5th edn, ed. S.G. Luxon, Royal Society of Chemistry, Cambridge, 1992, Bretherick has also summarised some frequently encountered incompatible chemicals that present either a reactive hazard or a toxic hazard if combined. These two lists are reprinted here as Tables 11.4 and 11.5 by kind permission of the Royal Society of Chemistry. In addition, potentially explosive combinations of some commonly-encountered laboratory reagents are shown in Table 11.6 (reproduced with permission from Chemical Safety Matters, lUPAC-IPCS, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1992). 

Table 4 lists some illustrative combinations of common laboratory reagents that can produce explosions when they are brought together or that form reaction products that can explode without any apparent external initiating action. This list is not exhaustive, and additional information on potentially explosive reagent combinations canbe found in Manual of Hazardous Chemical Reactions, A Compilation of Chemical Reactions Reported to be Potentially Hazardous, National Fire Protection Association, NFPA 491M, 1975, NFPA, 470 Adantic Avenue, Boston, MA 02210. 

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