Groundhog Day Birthday

[Sa'ar Chasm]

. ((the reason it has an explosive reaction with water in the first place is that the lone outer electron gets 'donated' to the oxygen if there is no chlorine (or equivalent) for it to react with. This forces the oxygen atom to lose the bond to one of it's hydrogen atoms, releasing pure, hot hydrogen. Guess what happens when large quantities of hot, flammable gas are released into the air?))

2Na(s) + 2H2O --> 2Na+(aq) + H2(g) + 2OH¯(aq) + heat, light, fizzes

NaCl(s) + H2O --> Na+(aq) + Cl¯(aq) + H2O

Na(s) + Cl2(g) --> KABOOM!

Being a chemistry major has to be good for something. Now if I could only figure out how to do super- and subscript...

Basically...elemental sodium reacts very readily with any sort of electronegative species - like chlorine or oxygen-containing species. Thermodynamically, Na(s) is very high in energy - which is bad. It loses this energy by reacting to form a more stable species - ionic sodium. The energy lost in this process is what's reponsible for all the fizzing and dancing and exploding. Exploding hydrogen gas is another matter entirely - it would probably send a lot of superheated air, hot water, sodium hydroxide (lye) and glass fragments at high velocities throughout the general vicinity.

/the more you know...
//Mr. Science mode OFF