TOXICITY:
Toxicity is the degree to which a substance or mixture of substances can harm humans or animals.
Toxic substances can affect humans in four main ways: by being swallowed (ingestion); through skin contact; through the lungs (inhalation) and through the eyes.
STATIC ELECTRICITY:
Static electricity presents fire and explosion hazards during the handling of petroleum and during other tanker operations such as tank cleaning, dipping, ullaging and sampling. Certain operations can give rise to accumulations of electric charge which may be released suddenly in electrostatic discharges with sufficient energy to ignite flammable hydrocarbon gas/air mixtures. There are three basic stages leading up to a potential static hazard: