Taichung: Two students at National Chung Hsing University (NCHU) were sent to hospital Thursday after handling chemical waste in the campus' food science and biotechnology building. A 24-year-old female student was splashed on the forehead with strong acid, resulting in a first-degree burn to 1 percent of her body, while a male student in the same lab experienced discomfort after potentially inhaling unidentified gas.
According to Focus Taiwan, nearly 100 people were evacuated from the building following the incident, and campus staff visited the injured students in the hospital. The accident reportedly occurred when mixed chemical waste liquids generated smoke, though the precise cause is still under investigation.
In a separate incident the day before, a lithium battery exploded in NCHU's engineering building, injuring the hand of a female student. The fire resulting from Wednesday's explosion was extinguished before fire crews arrived, and the cause of that incident is also under investigation.