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Thanks everybody!

---- Terry, I know this is off-topic. Please post it if you think there 
might be anyone interested in knowing how I’m doing. This is my first 
and last post about the accident, but if you choose to not post it, I’ll 
understand…-------

<<<< No problem Sam.  Just don't go having accidents like this all the time
;-))  - Terry >>>>

  Today, 8 days after my accident with peroxyacetone, I went back to the 
hospital to remove my bandages. My entire hand was bandaged and it took 
over half an hour to get it all off... It also hurt like hell and some 
wounds started to bleed again.
 So, now I had a first look at the damage after a plastic surgery. My 
hand looks like a hand granade went off near it. All cut up, bruised and 
with perforations by small bits of flying glass. My face, eyes and leg 
are now completely healed up from the small glass impacts I had.
 Now come the good news: While my hand and face were both hit by the 
blast and subsequent glass shower, the explosion happened so fast 
(several times faster than sound) that the glass was shattered into 
pieces that were no bigger than grains of rice. All the glass I got on 
my face was sand-grain sized. Fast, but with no real kinetic energy.
 Consequentially, Both my face and hand injuries, although extensive, 
were mostly superficial. I had one perforation of the skin, just above 
my right eye (one cm lower and I'd be blind), by something the size of a 
sand grain. Didn't go deep: 1mm at the most. The rest just hit and 
bounced off (or stuck but came off later).
 My hand has several smaller cuts and the uppermost layer of skin was 
stripped off 2 fingers and my thumb, with some cuts as well. All the 
blood that showered my shirt upon detonation must have come from those 
superficial injuries, that are now almost healed. I can move my fingers 
as well.
 Now, the real damage was done to my first (indicator finger). I was 
holding the glass when it exploded, between my thumb and indicator. That 
finger was thorn up so bad I can't even recognise it! It has 3 cuts down 
to the bone that run from base to tip, and, although they were opened by 
the blast, they are now closing up, with the help of my plastic surgery.
 So, from this mistake I'll have no permanent scars or damage whatsoever 
besides on this first finger. There I'll have those 3 deep scars and 
some nerve damage to the tip of the finger (can’t feel anything there). 
What movement I'll have depends on how the scar tissue forms, but right 
now, with my tendons, bone and flesh all there, it looks as if it is all 
going to be fine. I end my accident thread here (this is a Tesla list 
after all), with a warning: Dynamite, ammonium tri-iodide, 
nitro-glycerine, RDX, Lead azide, gun powder, and other 
explosive/deflagrants are easily made and available to anyone with basic 
chemical knowledge. I know because I have personally made 
nitro-glycerine and dynamite using a car battery, a couple of ESTES 
rocket engines, hand cream and saw dust. The actual compound that almost 
took my hand off was made from nailpolish remover and acetone. All the 
others mentioned above can be made from things everyone on this list has 
in their kitchen's, bathrooms and garages. So, with this easy 
availability of compounds and formulas (the government can't stop you 
from buying hair bleach, nailpolish remover or any of those compounds), 
explosives may seem like a viable form of entertainment. Sure, it's cool 
to see a banana be disintegrated and have it's mass shot in all 
directions faster than sound. And watching the water fly out of a small 
pond can be quite entertaining. I thought so. I was soo very careful. 
Never made too much, never stored them, always "knew" what I was doing. 
But the real lesson to be learned here is that even when you "know" what 
you are doing, accidents can happen. If you choose to experiment with 
such compounds you are taking a risk, which I understood well and 
accepted. But when things do go wrong you see that the risk was, in the 
end, unacceptable. I had 35 grams of peroxyacetone on that glass. It 
only choose to blow up when I had less than 3 grams left. Had it gone 
off before I would surely have died.
 This didn't happen to me because I was stupid, ignorant, careless or 
misguided. I knew what I was doing and I did it carefully. Accidents 
like this can and do happen to anyone, no matter how "good" they are. 
Nasa has had billion dollars satellites to blow up. Do you think they 
don't know what they are doing? It can happen to anyone dealing with 
high-power chemicals, and it could happen to you.
 Please be careful and learn from my mistake…

 Sam Barros.


“There are three kinds of people in this world: The stupid ones that 
repeat their mistakes, The intelligent ones that learn from their 
mistakes and the wise ones that learn from other people’s mistakes”
 Be wise!

 P.S. Please mail any posts regarding my accident privately at my 
personal mail sambarros-at-yahoo-dot-com . Keep the Tesla list for tesla 
coils...

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