28 Responses to “20,000 pounds of Sodium dumped in lake”

1. ectoplasmosis » 20,000 Pounds of Sodium Meets 20,000 Liters of Water, on November 1st, 2007 at 5:33 pm Said:

   […] Disposal of Sodium, 1947 [Google Video] : via FullyGeek.com. […]

2. Todd, on November 1st, 2007 at 5:38 pm Said:

   This is awesome. I did this in grad school, tho on a much smaller scale. The 4 liter flask had a good liter of hexane still in it along with a quarter pound of sodium. It went into the Genesee River in Rochester and I was rewarded with a huge boom and fire floating on water.

3. Dan Franklin, on November 1st, 2007 at 5:59 pm Said:

   I did this once - I put a pound of sodium in my butt and it mixed with the water in there and I was able to shoot flames 40 feet out of my anus for about a week!

4. Tech News » Blog Archive » What Happens to Sodium in a Lake?, on November 1st, 2007 at 6:17 pm Said:

   […] via Fully Geek comes this extremely awesome WW II era newsreel video of the military disposal of 20,000 lbs. of […]

5. Anon, on November 1st, 2007 at 8:05 pm Said:

   Greenpeace? How about the federal government, a la the EPA?

6. Anon, on November 2nd, 2007 at 1:06 am Said:

   Shame you’re not allowed to dispose of sodium in such a fun way anymore.

7. Favorite Videos (youtube) - Page 37 - BuckeyePlanet Ohio State Forums, on November 2nd, 2007 at 2:17 am Said:

   […] a youtube vid but amazing. Black and white newsreel about the post-war disposal of 20K lbs of elemental sodium […]

8. Troy, on November 2nd, 2007 at 4:18 am Said:

   I can’t imagine organisations like greenpeace allowing something like this to occur today

   Well, they’re not in power to disallow anything, but on what grounds do you think they would they complain? The film clip explicitly claimed it was an alkaline lake with no fish life, so number of tons of sodium wasn’t going to change much. . .

9. subatomicsunday » Seventh Grade Science + Sodium + Fish Tank = Suckage, on November 2nd, 2007 at 5:05 am Said:

   […] not much more to the story, but you should go check out the video that reminded me about that whole ordeal. [Link to Google […]

10. Phil Nelson – links for 2007-11-02, on November 2nd, 2007 at 1:22 pm Said:

    […] fullyGeek.com » 20,000 pounds of Sodium dumped in lake Video isn’t QUITE as awesome as one would expect. But WW II war surplus sodium + lake = big booms. (tags: sodium explosion science wwii) […]

11. Sodium + Water = Boom « My Whirled, on November 2nd, 2007 at 4:18 pm Said:

    […] […]

12. Ashley Pomeroy, on November 2nd, 2007 at 5:14 pm Said:

    Modern-day news bulletins would be enormously improved with jaunty big band music and stock sound effects of explosions.

13. Explosions in the name of science « The Oyster’s Garter, on November 3rd, 2007 at 4:16 am Said:

    […] Explosions in the name of science It’s post WWII. Nobody wants 20,000 lbs of highly reactive sodium. What to do? BOOM! […]

14. Gigantiška chemijos pamoka : nežinau.lt, on November 3rd, 2007 at 2:01 pm Said:

    […] Labai gerai pamenu, kaip per chemijos pamoką mokytoja į mėgintuvėlį su vandeniu įmetė mažą natrio gabaliuką. Gerai pamenu todėl, kad retas bandymas būdavo bent kiek panašus į fejerverką. Vėliau pusbrolis iš savo chemijos būrelio reagentų spintelės buvo suveikęs didesnių natrio gabalų, eksperimentai su kuriuo vandens dubenyje virtuvėje privertė daryti ankstyvą remontą šioje šeimos susirinkimo vietoje. O amerikiečiai po II-ojo pasaulinio karo smaginosi su milžiniškais natrio gabalais ežere… (via) […]

15. Sodium meets water | Chris Engelsma, on November 3rd, 2007 at 2:42 pm Said:

    […] Watch 20,000 pounds of surplus sodium get rolled into a lake.  Spectacular. […]

16. T J Sawyer, on November 3rd, 2007 at 3:26 pm Said:

    No Fish Life? Try Googling “Lake Lenore” and trout. “rated 9th best spring fed flyfishing stream in the western US”

    Wonder just which isotope of sodium this was giving the location near Hanford!

17. mike18xx, on November 4th, 2007 at 3:46 pm Said:

    Yes, it would certainly be illegal to convert sodium into SALT in a SALT LAKE today. Especially if it were FUN.

18. Endangered Species: Chemistry Sets « The Errant Æsthete, on November 5th, 2007 at 12:03 am Said:

    […] course, you have to be careful when you play with chemicals: like, never, ever drop 20,000 pounds of metallic sodium in a lake at home. […]

19. Randall, on November 6th, 2007 at 8:09 am Said:

    You see those large fluffy white clouds coming out of the explosions? Those are pure hydrogen sulfide, a toxic gas! It’s safe when diluted in the atmosphere, but those standing by to observe probably got lungfuls. That’s the real safety hazard here.

20. Ken, on November 6th, 2007 at 8:44 pm Said:

    Regarding those clouds of hydrogen sulfide coming off of the explosions … Hydrogen Sulfide is H2S. Where, exactly, is the Sulfur coming from to make that much Hydrogen Sulfide?

21. dan pritts, on November 6th, 2007 at 9:17 pm Said:

    according to wikipedia the reaction product of water & sodium is hydrogen gas and sodium hydroxide (lye). Hydrogen gas is probably harmless in free space like that, it’ll burn quickly and produce water.

    Lye is a highly caustic base chemical, but it’s widely used in industry. Not a great thing to dump in a lake, certainly.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium

22. brien, on November 7th, 2007 at 2:10 am Said:

    Actually, sodium hydroxide (a.k.a. lye) would be formed, which is soluble in water, and free hydrogen gas.

    I would think the fluffy white clouds would be water vapor, created from the lake water heated by the exothermic reaction in the lake and burning hydrogen gas.. It would then rise out of the lake and mix with air in the atmosphere, where the water vapor would supersaturate the air and cause visible condensation (a.k.a. fluffy white clouds).

23. Patrick unscripted, on November 11th, 2007 at 3:14 pm Said:

    […] What happens when you dump 20,000 lbs of sodium in a lake? No […]

24. Metallic Sodium vs. Frozen Lake, 1947 | The Daily Kicksplode, on November 12th, 2007 at 1:10 pm Said:

    […] at Fully Geek via Sore Eyes. This was written by widge. Posted on Monday, November 12, 2007, at 8:00 am. Filed […]

25. 9043 - thurs - « The Scotto Grotto, on November 14th, 2007 at 2:52 pm Said:

    […] do you get when you dump 10 tons of surplus weapons-grade sodium into a frozen lake? Boom ! (via fullygeek […]

26. Andy, on November 15th, 2007 at 1:08 am Said:

    Thanks God for America, I love freedom of speech. I have traveled the planet for 10 years. I am presently in Bangkok, after 7 months in West Africa.

    IF a person from Africa, a person from Bangkok would put up a video like this, they may very well have a knock on the door from the gestapo and suddenly never heard from again.

    This video makes me proud to be American….The USA, the only country that shows the dirty laundry, then the people demand it be cleaned. True corrupt countries are so corrupt, nobody can talk.

    USA, soon to be the cleanest country on planet, if not already.

27. Kilgore Trout, on November 17th, 2007 at 10:51 pm Said:

    What would you get if you installed a 95 square mile solar plant
    in the southwest?. The oil companies would send a hit squad
    of lobbyists to Washington.

28. Tom Lacher, on November 29th, 2007 at 7:40 pm Said:

    This is cool!! I teach school, my kids love it!! Oh, I’m a geek too!!

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