CANCELLED: DARS high power launch on Saturday, Jan 24 at Gunter.

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I smell a business opportunity. What we DARS folk need is a bumper sticker that reads,

WET HAPPENS
 
Updated the title to reflect the curse of the excessive wetness......

The weather system that got us appears to have wandered east and caused the cancellation of Battlepark, as well.
 
having to cancel is sad, but down the road maybe you won't suffer from burn bans! we are in a severe drought area (just north of you guys) and I am afraid burn bans will kick in pretty soon. we just got a launch site (actually our original location) and plan to launch in February (pending wind, etc)

the situation looks pretty dire for all of us in the Texhoma area... https://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/
 
Today was just too perfect. Clear blue sky, light and variable winds and temperature 75 to 80 depending on your exact location. So, what to do? Hmmmm? Maybe this.

[video=youtube;uXY3UUO5G2Q]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXY3UUO5G2Q[/video]

IMG_1008.jpg
 
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You're killing me, Ted.

Aw shucks Chris. Look at the bright side. You could be in Boston! :wink:

Let me know if you want to play hooky some bluebird day and we'll go torch a maxed out mid power somewhere. It's really awful living outside of civilization. No one to argue with and nothing much to do.
But one thing is for sure: We don't need no stinking waivers, we just do it!
 
Weather was just perfect today. Perfect. Glad you were able to take advantage.
 
Today was just too perfect. Clear blue sky, light and variable winds and temperature 75 to 80 depending on your exact location. So, what to do? Hmmmm? Maybe this.

[video=youtube;uXY3UUO5G2Q]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXY3UUO5G2Q[/video]

Well. I think I can speak for all us working stiffs, THANKS TED (^@#$&*) ! :grin:
 
Aw shucks Chris. Look at the bright side. You could be in Boston! :wink:

Let me know if you want to play hooky some bluebird day and we'll go torch a maxed out mid power somewhere. It's really awful living outside of civilization. No one to argue with and nothing much to do.
But one thing is for sure: We don't need no stinking waivers, we just do it!

Should have taken you up on this today. Instead I came to work, had a reaction catch fire, burned up my material at step 5 (of 6), and got sand everywhere putting it out...damn metal fires. Oh well, at least I still have my eyebrows.
 
Should have taken you up on this today. Instead I came to work, had a reaction catch fire, burned up my material at step 5 (of 6), and got sand everywhere putting it out...damn metal fires. Oh well, at least I still have my eyebrows.

Artists rendition of the Doctor at work:

boy scientist.jpg

:)
 
Actually my avitar was a pretty accurate picture sans the red hair. First fire in 6 years...that is a long streak for an organic chemist.
 
If you see me running try to keep up!

Similar to what we tell any new biologists in the lab. If a chemist runs past don't waist time with questions, just run. Preferably upwind.

They think I'm kidding until I tell them about the four times I've run.

1) When a lab mate heated a sealed glass pressure vessel of hydrazine to >200 C. I don't know what temp it blew at, but the answer to what is in the fluidic sand heating bath should never be hydrazine.
2) Once when the regulator on a compressed hydrochloric acid gas cylinder blew a leak and started to spew forth a cloud of pH<1 fog. Corroded everything in the room.
3) When my undergrad screwed up my cold trap/vacuum system, and condensed what I believe was about half a liter of liquid oxygen. Not sure it was LOX, but it had that pale blue you are about to die look, and came from the ambient atmosphere, so seams like a likely suspect. In any event I didn't hang around to find out...mercifully whatever it was boiled off harmlessly after the cold traps were removed.
4) When I had a compound spontaneously combust sitting on my bench...that was more confusion than terror.
 
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...damn metal fires. Oh well, at least I still have my eyebrows.

I read this and thought immediately about being at one of my suppliers a few years ago when some of the titanium chips caught fire. It might have been more interesting for me if it hadn't damaged their 5-axis machine. Ended up causing me a ton more work to qualify a new supplier.
 
Once upon a time I was using a belt sander on a peice of wood and ran into a hidden broken drywall screw in the wood.

The sander had been used to sand aluminum, polyurethane plastic and wood over the last couple of days and had a nice mix of those three kinds of dust in the collector...several ounces.

The sparks from the screw lit it off and the burn rate was spectacular. Went off almost like flash powder. Nothing damaged but scared the crap out of me.

Mix it with some binder and some oxidizer and it would make thrust....:)@
 
Similar to what we tell any new biologists in the lab. If a chemist runs past don't waist time with questions, just run. Preferably upwind.

They think I'm kidding until I tell them about the four times I've run.

1) When a lab mate heated a sealed glass pressure vessel of hydrazine to >200 C. I don't know what temp it blew at, but the answer to what is in the fluidic sand heating bath should never be hydrazine.
2) Once when the regulator on a compressed hydrochloric acid gas cylinder blew a leak and started to spew forth a cloud of pH<1 fog. Corroded everything in the room.
3) When my undergrad screwed up my cold trap/vacuum system, and condensed what I believe was about half a liter of liquid oxygen. Not sure it was LOX, but it had that pale blue you are about to die look, and came from the ambient atmosphere, so seams like a likely suspect. In any event I didn't hang around to find out...mercifully whatever it was boiled off harmlessly after the cold traps were removed.
4) When I had a compound spontaneously combust sitting on my bench...that was more confusion than terror.

Sounds like fun, mostly :). Hydrazine? We should definitely talk.
 
Once upon a time I was using a belt sander on a peice of wood and ran into a hidden broken drywall screw in the wood.

The sander had been used to sand aluminum, polyurethane plastic and wood over the last couple of days and had a nice mix of those three kinds of dust in the collector...several ounces.

The sparks from the screw lit it off and the burn rate was spectacular. Went off almost like flash powder. Nothing damaged but scared the crap out of me.

Mix it with some binder and some oxidizer and it would make thrust....:)@

Wow, that's scary.
 
Similar to what we tell any new biologists in the lab. If a chemist runs past don't waist time with questions, just run. Preferably upwind.

They think I'm kidding until I tell them about the four times I've run.

1) When a lab mate heated a sealed glass pressure vessel of hydrazine to >200 C. I don't know what temp it blew at, but the answer to what is in the fluidic sand heating bath should never be hydrazine.
2) Once when the regulator on a compressed hydrochloric acid gas cylinder blew a leak and started to spew forth a cloud of pH<1 fog. Corroded everything in the room.
3) When my undergrad screwed up my cold trap/vacuum system, and condensed what I believe was about half a liter of liquid oxygen. Not sure it was LOX, but it had that pale blue you are about to die look, and came from the ambient atmosphere, so seams like a likely suspect. In any event I didn't hang around to find out...mercifully whatever it was boiled off harmlessly after the cold traps were removed.
4) When I had a compound spontaneously combust sitting on my bench...that was more confusion than terror.

Reminds me of an interesting event when I was in grad school - a postdoc was cleaning glassware used in Birch reductions (Na, K, Li residue), and neglected to kill all the active metal. Dumped a flask in the base bath (KOH/isopropanol) and it lit off like a candle. Wouldn't have been that big a deal except for A) the base bath was a plastic tub on the floor with no lid, and B) the attempt by said postdoc to extinguish the fire involved spraying an extinguisher directly into the tub, spraying contents all over the floor. At that point the postdoc just took off. Near as can be determined, the IPA that spilled on the floor was enough to melt the tub (which held about 12 or so liters of IPA), which eventually ignited the cabinetry. Burned out a whole lab.
 
Reminds me of an interesting event when I was in grad school - a postdoc was cleaning glassware used in Birch reductions (Na, K, Li residue), and neglected to kill all the active metal. Dumped a flask in the base bath (KOH/isopropanol) and it lit off like a candle. Wouldn't have been that big a deal except for A) the base bath was a plastic tub on the floor with no lid, and B) the attempt by said postdoc to extinguish the fire involved spraying an extinguisher directly into the tub, spraying contents all over the floor. At that point the postdoc just took off. Near as can be determined, the IPA that spilled on the floor was enough to melt the tub (which held about 12 or so liters of IPA), which eventually ignited the cabinetry. Burned out a whole lab.

For some reason our postdocs were into accidentally poisoning themselves. One broke a 500 mL bottle of pyridine and fell in it, he absorbed so much through his skin and cuts that he got violent shakes for a few days...probably a big enough exposure to ensure no kids in his future. Then the adjacent lab had the guy who quenched a TMS-cyanide reaction with acid. He barely lived, spent a time in the hospital getting pumped full of iron and breathing pure oxygen...he gave up chemistry, probably a good choice. Mercifully my postdoc was less eventful.

I think this has been quite a successful thread hijacking...All your thread are belong to us!
 
For some reason our postdocs were into accidentally poisoning themselves. One broke a 500 mL bottle of pyridine and fell in it, he absorbed so much through his skin and cuts that he got violent shakes for a few days...probably a big enough exposure to ensure no kids in his future. Then the adjacent lab had the guy who quenched a TMS-cyanide reaction with acid. He barely lived, spent a time in the hospital getting pumped full of iron and breathing pure oxygen...he gave up chemistry, probably a good choice. Mercifully my postdoc was less eventful.

:eyepop:Man, I'm glad I majored in history.
 
:eyepop:Man, I'm glad I majored in history.

This is actually a pretty cool thread hi jack. Since Ted accepts full blame, l'll continue :). There was a dude in my mechanical engineering class working on a lithium bromide absorption refrigeration system for semi-trailer trucks. They were working on some process that required him to pull a vacuum on a glass jar. Well, it imploded. And, he wasn't wearing safety glasses. He went to the hospital.
 
I ended up going home for Thanksgiving my freshman year with an orange hand. My lab partner had a rather unfortunately timed sneezed and spilled nitric acid on my hand.


I think there have been more posts to this thread since the launch was cancelled than prior. Me thinks we need to get some flying in soon.
 
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