HS chemistry teacher arrested for lesson on explosives!

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/02/16/teacher.arrested.ap/

I would like to hear the TEACHER'S side of this story, rather than the regurgitated police reports and feigned outrage the media reports. The best demonstrations in a science class are the ones that really grab the student's attention.

This teacher was apparently the winner of the ACS "Outstanding HS Teacher" award in 2003:

http://membership.acs.org/o/orlando/Awards/awards_banquet.htm

I particularly love this line from the CNN story:

How completely irresponsible! I guess it would be better if he told the students to ignite the mixture with a match while standing right next to it?

I think back to my HS chemistry and physics classes. My physics teacher had us construct and fire "golf ball cannons" on the school football field during our study of ballistics and trajectory. And in chemistry class, we detonated a balloon filled with acetylene and oxygen, in addition to making thermite!

Nowadays, the whole class would be arrested as "terrorists"!

 

Yeah, my high school chemistry teacher showed us all kinds of cool explosions and fires whenever we asked him to. It wasn't really part of the lesson, but if we got done with class a few minutes early, he'd always show us something neat.

Unless the teacher in this story was being irresponsible, I don't see what they can charge him with. But since I wasn't there, I don't claim to know whether or not he broke any laws.

 

I loved the part about him not being allowed to have any explosives or explosive compounds.
Yup kiddies, we're only going to read about Chemistry.

But ya never know... He could be an "evil doer", he could be a "terrwrist", he could be a blue-stater, he could think that gay marriage is OK!

 

Oh, yes, our chemistry teacher also loved to blow stuff up and show us about it! It was a great way of getting students' interest in an otherwise pretty tough subject... no one ever saw the harm in it... When, due to a shortage of classrooms, an English teacher known for his booming voice taught our class in one of the science classrooms, and they were always onto eachother for 'disturbing each other's classes' the science teacher finally set off a pretty big boom right behind the blackboard, that was great! We all laughed about that -even the English teacher - and it was the talk of the school...

 

Haha, we had a teacher that got fired for that among other things. All the kids loved it lol. Although no one at my school was stupid enough to go out and blow shit up in any way other than a test or something The thing that sort of put some people off though was his constant flirting with the girls, and sometimes degradation of them too. That's when the complaints came in, and that coupled with the bomb stuff sort of clinched, it and his ass was out.

 

almost any intro to chem class teaches energy in rxns. The most common example is explosions. Everyone learns that. I bet some overprotective parant freaked out and called the cops and they of course just word it to sound bad. There goes another blow to teaching people science thanks to dumb parants.

 

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I'd put money on at least half of high school chemistry teachers out there teaching their students how to make bombs one way or another. You know... people shouldn't be questioning the teacher, they should be questioning the kids. And what's the harm anyway? Did anyone actually get hurt?


My friends and I made bombs for about four years and never once even had a close accident. All you have to do is take one basic chemistry class (if even that) and you can understand the basic properties of bomb making. And besides, if it wasn't the high school teacher, there is all the information and bomb-making supplies readily available online.

 

...hell, all you need is a block of pure sodium.

 

lol, you cant have sodium without a licence... and its fucking expensive... like, 20 bucks a gram..

 

You can't have sodium without a license?


There are a million chemicals out there that you have to be 18 to buy, and have a license, but it is so unbelievably easy to get them anyway. ...we did when we were 15. Businesses selling the chemicals on the internet are horrible at doing thorough background checks on their buyers.

And if sodium is too expensive for you, you can always buy things like AP, which are equally priced, but 1mL makes a 3ft. crater, so it lasts much longer. Or if you just want something for kicks... pure magnesium is really cheap and can be used in a variety of ways.

 

What license is that? I have purchased sodium and a lot of other potentially hazardous stuff and never been asked for any kind of "license".

As elements go, sodium is dirt cheap, nowhere near $20/gram. How about a half-pound (over 220 grams) of the stuff for $55, no questions asked?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=413&item=6156566005&rd=1

For an idea of the fun you can have with a big chunk of sodium, check out:

http://www.theodoregray.com/PeriodicTable/Stories/011.2/

 

Oh yeah, I completely forgot about the abundance of bomb-making materials on ebay.


And again, about the license thing... one of my friends started a business (without a business license) selling pure magnesium when he was 17. Honest to god, he bought 1 ton of magnesium from China... no questions asked.

 

If you want a big lump of Mg, it's as close as your local junkyard. Get an old VW engine or transaxle case from a beetle or microbus. Build a big bonfire, get it good and hot, then chuck the engine case in! Dark welding goggles are recommended for viewing....

BTW, if the fire gets out of control, DON'T POUR WATER ON IT!

Magnesium burns so hot that it splits the water into hydrogen and oxygen, which then explode.... Dry sand or a special (class D) extinguisher is needed to put out an Mg fire.

 

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I always wanted to see what would happen if you dropped a piece of cesium into water, but Cs is a bit harder to get than Na and K...

 

Cs would be similar to the others in that family (Ki, Na, K, Rb). I never tried cesium. I have potassium that's packed in oil to keep it from oxidizing. Lithium is dangerous too. All of these are even more dangerous in particle form. An open can of them could literally explode if it's disturbed. I've done work with lithium particles. Lithium particles go airborn readily and irritate your throat if you inhale just a little of them.

 

We watched a video of that in a chemistry class I took a few years back. It reacts basically the same as sodium, except the explosion is bigger.

 

I may be wrong on this, but doesn't Cs create a pretty big explosion with any slight disturbance to it (water, droping it, touching it with a feather)? I may be thinking of a different element...

 

I think it would depend on what was disturbing it. Cesium is the most electropositive naturally-occuring element that exists. Water would definitely disturb it, as could exposing it to any of the MANY things it reacts with. I'm not sure that just dropping it would do anything, unless you dropped it into a puddle of water.