Colleagues,

I had the opportunity to address the use of elevators for chemical transport while I served as CHO at Cal Poly SLO.  We had (I had) a specific attitude about elevators and chemicals that simply stated is:  nobody rides on an elevator with the chemicals.  It was written in the training document we used for new employees to EH&S  (most often Student Assistants).   This writing laid out our practices concerning elevators and chemicals.  Is this "policy"; within EH&S I like to think so.   In those days EH&S didn't "make policy" for campus departments and perhaps still doesn't.  Deans and Department Heads did that, but this is a different conversation.

My every-day use of this elevator protocol involved the removal of Hazardous Waste (HW) from buildings on campus, some of which were 2 to 4 stories.  At the time the Chemistry department was in an older 1-story building, so life was simple there.   Now Chemistry/Biochemistry is in a new 5-story building. I'm not sure what EH&S or the Chemistry department does about elevators now.     I think the new building has a freight elevator - one that requires a key to access.

I recall reading one of those worst possible case histories involving two people moving bottles of 98% sulfuric acid (perhaps other things too) between floors using a public elevator in a research building.  The details are long ago lost to me, but the punch line is that somehow one or more of the sulfuric acid bottle were broken while in the elevator, contacting both occupants.    Both had to stand around in the descending elevator waiting for the doors to open.   Both gained access to emergency showers after leaving the elevator.  One victim showered for about 1 minute then ran on the get himself to the hospital. The other victim stayed in the shower for 15 minutes before proceeding on to further medical treatment.     The 15 minute guy survived; one-minute man didn't.  This anecdote was originally intended to emphasize the importance of the 15 minute rule for emergency showers, but I was impressed by the role played by the elevator trap.  I had images of screaming victims stuck in a penalty box before being allowed to proceed to the first step of rescue.    This one always stuck with me, hence: nobody rides on an elevator with the chemicals.

In practical terms, whenever I had a HW pickup scheduled, I always used two people for the task - multiple floors or not.  In the case of elevators (most were "public" - push the button and wait) we would leap frog floors down to the ground floor for loading into our vehicle.   We assembled our own Lab Packs or used DOT compliant containers to insure that no spills or leaks would complicate our on-campus transport.    The couple of serious leakers I recall managed only to mess up the overpack container and not affect the vehicle.  --  For example, Biology has a stockroom on the 3rd floor.  We would roll a cart of lab packs into the elevator on 3.  One of us would hustle down the stairs to 2 and call the 3-guy (we had 2-way radios at the time) to send the load (push the 2 button and step out of the elevator).  3-guy would then run down 2 flights of stairs to 1 and call the 2-guy to send the load (push 1 and step out of the elevator).  At each intervening floor one of us was there to hold up any public traffic.

I think transport of any chemical collection of 2 bottles or more needs to be in a container.   A medium 1-bottle load (or 2 very small bottles) can be carried in one hand, leaving the other hand to manipulate doors and stair railings.   A bunch of bottles in a 5- gallon bucket still leaves one hand free.   Other sizes and types of buckets will do as is convenient and available, but the "5-gallon bucket" is ubiquitous.   But I digress.

I have qualms about a person riding in an elevator with a large dewar of liquid nitrogen he is moving.   An elevator malfunction would be slowly fatal  - same with dry ice.  If the dewar were of a design that could be dropped or spilled,  a functioning elevator could be life threatening.     

I just don't like the thought of being stuck in a box with something that could kill me ONLY IF AND BECAUSE I can't get out of the penalty box before time is up.     I never saw the movie "Snakes on a Plane", but that title alone gives me the same adrenaline spike as does the thought of sitting on a case of glacial acetic acid in an elevator.

At the time of the design of the new science building we actually proposed the inclusion of a dumb waiter(s) between specific rooms/floors for chemical movement.     I believe the architects eventually settled on a key-access freight elevator.  At least in that case, trained employees are the only ones involved in chemical transport and any elevator protocols about riding or not riding with the chemicals.

Thanks for listening

Mike Ahler

From: ACS Division of Chemical Health and Safety <DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**PRINCETON.EDU> on behalf of Lawrence M Gibbs <lgibbs**At_Symbol_Here**STANFORD.EDU>
Sent: Monday, February 13, 2017 12:16:09 PM
To: DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**PRINCETON.EDU
Subject: Re: [DCHAS-L] Chemicals and passenger elevators

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