Wednesday, February 20, 2019

safety - In practice, how dangerous is liquid oxygen as an oxidizing agent?


The Wikipedia page on liquid oxygen tells us



Liquid oxygen is also a very powerful oxidizing agent [...], if soaked in liquid oxygen, some materials such as coal briquettes, carbon black, etc., can detonate unpredictably from sources of ignition such as flames, sparks or impact from light blows.



I have heard similar warnings about LOX in texts about amateur and semi-professional rocketry, but I know nobody who has ever handled stuff like this.


In practice, say I spill some LOX and soak paper lying around (that maybe has been warmed by a desk lamp), will that burst into a fireball?



Maybe more to the point, how do I assess such risks short of conducting foolhardy experiments? Is there a way to estimate the maximum effect a given amount of spillage on a given material may have?




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