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> A lithium fire takes hours and thousands of gallons of water to subside Doesn't lithium react violently with water? Looking online, lithium creates hydrogen
by jolmg 7y ago
> A lithium fire takes hours and thousands of gallons of water to subside
Doesn't lithium react violently with water? Looking online, lithium creates hydrogen gas on contact with water. That seems like adding fuel to the fire. Makes sense that it takes a lot to extinguish a fire with fuel.
- bananabreakfast 7y agoA lithium battery is made of lithium compounds not raw lithium. Expecting it to react the same way as pure lithium is a profound misunderstanding of basic chemistry.
- jolmg 7y agoYou know, you could have left it at the first sentence. There's no need to incorrectly assume what my expectations were or the source of the misunderstanding.
- matt-attack 7y agoKind of like when people commonly refer to table salt as “sodium”. Sodium is a highly caustic and reactive metal. The metal sodium is profoundly different than the salt called sodium chloride. Sharing a specific type of element means nothing when comparing compounds.