Medical School Explosion Injures Two, Destroys Lab, Causes $100,000 Damage

An explosion and fire ripped through a histology lab at Harvard Medical School Friday afternoon, injuring two technicians and causing an estimated $100,000 damage.

Quick work by Boston firemen and the Harvard Buildings and Grounds staff saved vital experimental material, representing ten years' research by one of the laboratory's directors, that was being stored in the lab's "cold room."

The explosion occurred at 1:30 p.m. in a pathology department laboratory in Building D-1 of the Medical School.

Dolores Stewart, 33, of Cambridge, and Donna Happel, 22, of Boston, both working inside the lab when the explosion occurred, were treated for burns at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital. Now at Stillman Infirmary, they were unavailable for comment, but hospital spokesmen said they were "fairly comfortable" and "doing well."

The women had been conducting experiments with methanol, a highly flammable wood alcohol. Officials said the explosion resulted "apparently because of a spark of static electricity" when the women were pouring the methanol from one container to another.

The explosion ignited other cans of methanol in the room, turning it into what a witness called "a mass of smoke and flame."

Miss Happel managed to run from the room, but Miss Stewart, her clothing ablaze, had to be pulled from the lab by Patrick Skihil, another technician. He threw her to the ground and rolled her over and over until he had extinguished the flames.

Doctors said Skihil's prompt action prevented Miss Stewart's burns from being more severe than first degree.

Dr. Thomas J. Gill, '53, Director of the laboratories of Chemical Pathology, said that the room contained materials for "general histological research," including experiments in tissue transplantation.

The materials for Dr. Gill's ten-year research into synthetic polypeptides were being stored in the lab's "cold room" refrigerators. In his research, Dr. Gill was studying antigens and the antibody response they cause in humans. The cultures in the cold room were irreplaceable, Dr. Gill said.

Henry C. Meadow, associate dean of Medicine for financial affairs, said that the cold room cultures were saved only by the "extraordinarily cooperative" work of the firemen. "The firemen spoke with the people in charge of the lab," Meadow said, "and tried to save the cold room material." Dr. Gill also praised the efforts of the B.&G. staff. According to Meadow, the loss was mainly in chemicals and instrumentation. "The basic materials were saved," he said.

The lab itself was nearly destroyed by the explosion. Windows were blown out and furniture strewn about the room. Other rooms in the building, however, suffered little damage.