In Los Angeles December 29th
2008, was the day that Sangji 23 got in a laboratory accident and died on
January 16th. Sangji was working on a reaction involving
tert-Butyllithium. Tert-Butyllithium is known to ignite spontaneously with air.
Patrick Harran was the chemistry professor in charge of Sangji and was upstairs
at the time of the accident. Harran had caused the accident through the
teachings of improper lab technique and personal protective equipment. Sangji had
never been properly trained or even issued a lab coat, she was wearing improper
lab dress, a synthetic sweatshirt, instead of wearing a lab coat which is a lot
more flammable. This was not the first warning of improper lab techniques, two
other students had been burned before and the lab had been issued many
citations.
The
university and the DA reached a settlement, in return for admitting
responsibility for the lab conditions when Sangji died, for promising to
maintain a comprehensive lab safety program, and for setting up a $500,000 environmental
law scholarship at Berkeley in Sangjji’s name, prosecutors dropped the charges.
However, the case against Harran continued and was sent to trial. Harran faced
up to 4.5 years in prison and UCLA could be fined up to $1.5 million. The
results of the trail was that Harran had to participate in community service
and pay a $10,000 fine. Harran’s punishment was nothing more than a slap on the
wrist. This caused a panic throughout the academic community. Many professors
don’t see themselves as managers to the students in their graduate help,
especially with the high rate of turnover. This case helped to rapidly change
the culture of labs throughout colleges in America.
UCLA
after the case achieved a 95% compliance with the personal protective equipment
policy. One such improvement is a series of unannounced safety improvements.
Though the Environmental Health and Safety department at UCLA made all of these
claims, one professor said that this was not true and that earlier that week
they had seen students in the lab wearing flip flops and shorts.
Now, there have been many more
forceful and frequent training and safety discussions not just at UCLA but at
any college with lab work. There has been a shift from a mindset of get through
the training now I’m done, to actually paying attention to the training and
general safety not only with the students but with the professors in charge as
well. The system that had existed for so long, that had tolerated these poor
training systems have started being challenged and slowly getting fixed over
the years across the country since the accident. Many schools started providing
incentives for practicing good safety, some even provided grant money or space
that could serve as a reward for the safest labs. Even though colleges could
add incentives there should still be strict punishments instructed if a college
or a student or a professor breaks any safety rules. Today the UCLA
environmental and health safety webpage is one of the most reliable sites for
safety rules and protocol.
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