CAUTION: DO NOT DO THIS WITH SOMEONE IN THE POOL! IT IS VERY DANGEROUS AS THE EVAPORATED NITROGEN DISPLACES THE OXYGEN IN THE AIR AND SOMEONE COULD SUFFOCATE AND POSSIBLE DEATH.
At AstroCamp, we love exploring and testing theories. So what do we do when we have excess liquid nitrogen from our summer camp program that will evaporate before we can use it again? Why we do some experiments of course! Our favorite recent experiment was dumping the left over liquid nitrogen into the pool. We thought we were going to get a lot of condensation from the water vapor coming into contact with the cold liquid nitrogen. What we forgot to take into account was the Leidenfrost Effect. The Leidenfrost Effect occurs when a liquid comes into contact with a surface much hotter than it. Because of the drastic change in temperature, the liquid that comes into contact with the surface boils near instantly. But the boiled gas creates a buffer for the rest of the liquid and keeps it from evaporating for a while longer. In the pool, this allows the liquid nitrogen to spread across the surface of the water, expanding the fog until it nearly covers the pool entirely. Stay tuned for future fun things to do with liquid nitrogen exploration!
