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Asked by to Daryl, Nimesh, Sandra, Anita, Amy on 19 Jun 2014. This question was also asked by , , , .
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Anita Thomas answered on 19 Jun 2014:
Dear 124yayicancount,
The most dangerous experience I’ve had as a scientist? The nastiest experience was when I was part of a team trapping marsupial mice in a rainforest (an ecology experiment). We were trapping in the area near a stream – and it was very very very very wet (did I mention that it was a bit damp?). When we returned to the others, they more-or-less screamed at us to go away and strip. So we did. I had 70 leaches on me. David had one up his nose, and Elaine even had one through the ear-ring hole in her ear (no ear-ring in it). But that wasn’t dangerous.
No, the most dangerous experience I had as a scientist was one that I didn’t even know about at the time. I was one of several people happily working in a Molecular Biology Lab (where we do experiments to look at genes and so-on). After a couple of days, the manager of the lab did a routine check of the radiation levels in the lab (this was the bad old days of using P-32 to label our samples). There were drops of P-32 everywhere! Somebody (a student, who should have known better) had dripped a gel from bench to bench to bench, leaving a trail of radiation all over the place. As you can appreciate, none of us were very happy with the student!
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Amy Monaghan answered on 19 Jun 2014:
Hi everyone – great question
The most dangerous experience that I have had as a scientist was probably when I was working at the hospital in Edinburgh analysing blood samples of patients. One of the doctors left a needle in one of the samples that I was looking at, and I was nearly stabbed. Although this doesn’t sound too bad we have no idea what diseases might have been on that needle – from HIV to tuberculosis. We had to fill out a lot of paperwork and the doctor responsible got a very stern talking to.
One of my friends probably has a much more exciting story though. They were out in Africa studying a tower of giraffe (yes a group of giraffe is called a tower) in one of the nature reserves. They were out all day and as it started to get dark they started to head back to their camp. What they didn’t realise was that two lioness’ were stalking them for an evening meal! As they left the lions chased their jeep for a few miles before they gave up! I’ve definitely never been chased as food for any of my science experiments!
Amy
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Sandra Chiwanza answered on 19 Jun 2014:
Hi,
We once identified or incorrectly identified an organism as one that is known as a bio-agent of terrorism. So, we had to notify the Health Protection Agency , I think now known as Public Health England. In addition we had to put our laboratory under lock down until we got the all clear…
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Daryl Jones answered on 19 Jun 2014:
Good question! The most dangerous experience was when we had a power cut in a snow storm at the royal vet college in London. I had to walk to work at 3am in the morning to save my samples in the freezer before they defrosted! I walked 2 miles in the snow, in the dark! And when i got there, ALL the lights were out and all the doors were open and the wind was howling down the corridors, it was SO creepy! And then when i got into the lab, with just a small torch, I opened the freezer and highly infectious material had defrosted and was pouring out all over the floor!!!!!!! It was dangerous and scary!
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Nimesh Mistry answered on 20 Jun 2014:
I found an experiment in my lab that someone else put on that was close to exploding so I had to quench it safely. Basically they had accidently made molten sodium. This YouTube clip shows what can happen:
It was scary and my hands were shaking when I was dealing with it. I’d probably be dead if it had exploded.
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Anita commented on :
Almost forgot. When I was working in a Pharmacology/Toxicology department (ie working with how drugs work and how much drug is bad for you) I was asked to clean up a ‘forgotten’ room. I found a sealed tin in the back of one cupboard, with just a code on it. I tried to find out what it was, but it was very rusty, and I could just make out a little bit of a serial number in one corner. I googled it, so I could get some idea of what it might be. It turned out to be some sort of nerve gas, left over (some how) from the Vietnam war!