My Physics teacher
My Physics teacher was a lovely man called Mr Howell. We had many lessons with him that involved things catching fire or otherwise being destroyed, but the experiment that most sticks out in my mind was an A Level class involving a UV lamp and a plastic bucket.

He comes in, smiling that we're going to have an exciting experiment today, and plugs the UV lamp in to show it off. He then proceeds to tell us how dangerous UV light is, and to keep us safe, he's going to put a plastic bucket over the lamp. You'd think a man teaching physics would realise the issues of putting something plastic on top of something that gets very hot, and that maybe just turning the lamp off for the time being while we weren't using it would be the proper course of action. You'd be wrong.

Twenty minutes into the lesson, with Mr Howell explaining the theory behind this experiment of his, one of the kids started complaining of a funny smell. The smell of burning plastic. Mr Howell rushed over to the lamp and took the bucket off. There was a funny noise and we looked at the lamp. The bottom of the bucket was stuck to the lamp and the bucket now had a large hole in it.

We learned an important lesson that day. Putting a plastic bucket on a hot object is dangerous.

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(HeavyMetalHeadRush crashed into your car at, Thu 24 Mar 2011, 0:52, Reply)