A researcher was working with hydrogen storage materials in a laboratory. Several other researchers were working in adjacent laboratories.

A hydrogen cylinder was initially located in an adjacent laboratory, with tubing going through the wall into the laboratory in use. When the cylinder was moved to the laboratory in use, a required leak check was not performed. Unfortunately, a leak had developed that was sufficient to cause an accumulation of hydrogen to a level above the Lower Flammability Limit. The hydrogen ignited when a computer power plug was pulled from an outlet. The exact configuration of the leak location and the outlet plug is unknown.

A facility uses small crucibles to heat precious metals within a fume hood, with natural gas as the fuel source for the Bunsen burner. Hydrogen is fed into the crucible at low pressure (<20 psi) to control the atmosphere within the vessel in order to prevent oxidation. The hydrogen is routed through a manifold with flexible tubing, which is connected to a ceramic tip and fitted into the crucible through a small opening in the crucible's lid. The hydrogen is consumed in the process. The facility believes that the hydrogen tubing developed a leak which eventually ignited.

An employee of an incubator company that was working in a university-owned laboratory facility was checking the hydrogen pressure through the main valve on a hydrogen cylinder. The regulator on this cylinder had not been properly closed. Hydrogen escaped through the regulator and was ignited. The fire was contained in the laboratory and extinguished by the building's fire sprinkler system before fire crews arrived. There were no injuries, and damage estimates were not available.

A brazing retort in a shop malfunctioned and resulted in an explosion that propelled the retort shell to the roof of the brazing area and then back to the floor. There were no injuries but damage was sustained by the furnace housing and the retort shell.

Administrative personnel were soon on the scene to make a preliminary assessment of the situation. An expert safety team was retained to assist in the investigation of the explosion. The safety team conducted their initial field investigation on the afternoon of the explosion and again on the following day.

An incident involved an explosion of an oven that was heating decaborane for vaporization. In this incident, the heater controller was defective so the heating element was disconnected from the controller and plugged directly into a wall outlet. This situation allowed the oven to reach temperatures in excess of 400 °C within 20 minutes. While the temperature increased, the decaborane continued to expand, causing a significant pressure build-up within the oven. The pressure increase eventually caused the oven's viewing window to burst.

An explosion occurred in a Microbiological Anaerobic Chamber of approximately 2 m3 capacity that contained an explosive mixture of hydrogen and air. A fire followed the explosion, but was rapidly extinguished by staff using fire extinguishers prior to the arrival of fire service personnel. The pressure wave from the explosion blew windows out of the laboratory, with glass hitting a passerby on a path outside and glass shards landing up to 30 m away.

Several workers sustained minor injuries and millions of dollars worth of equipment was damaged by an explosion after a shaft blew out of a check valve. The valve failure rapidly released a large vapor cloud of hydrogen and hydrocarbon gases which subsequently ignited.Certain types of check and butterfly valves can undergo shaft-disk separation and fail catastrophically or "blow-out," causing toxic and/or flammable gas releases, fires, and vapor cloud explosions. Such failures can occur even when the valves are operated within their design limits of pressure and temperature.

A 30-milliliter (mL) vacuum bulb, equipped with a glass stopcock, containing one gram of pentacarbonyl manganese hydride exploded in a refrigerator. This caused the breakage of three other containers, releasing some contents into the refrigerator. The chemicals did not react. The refrigerator contained numerous reactive and flammable chemicals, mostly in glass containers.

A person working in a hydrogen lab unknowingly closed the wrong hydrogen valve and proceeded to loosen a fitting in one of the hydrogen gas lines. The pressure in the 1/4"-diameter hydrogen line was approximately 110 psig. Hydrogen escaped from the loosened fitting and the pressure release resulted in the tubing completely detaching and falling to the floor. The person noted seeing a white stream around the hydrogen jet leak. The person noted a color change and noise change as the leak ignited (this happened in a matter seconds and he did not have a chance to react).