Stop this seemingly normal action immediately but it causes potential dangers that you don't expect
In the hot summer, almost everyone "keeps" a bottle of water with them wherever they go, to avoid the tiring situation of having to go out in the sun to buy it. And if you are a person who owns a car, then there is a high probability that you have the habit of leaving a bottle of water in the car, especially conveniently at the front of the car or next to the driver's seat.
In an experiment by Dioni Amuchastegui - an electrical engineer in Idaho (USA), a bottle of water can gather sunlight and create a heat source exceeding 100 degrees Celsius. If the bottle of water is placed on a dark surface (such as a seat for example), the heat source created is enough to catch fire and create a disaster.
In fact, a bottle of water in the car causing a fire requires quite a few factors, but that does not mean it cannot happen. Amuchastegui himself had almost encountered a similar incident before, so he decided to do an experiment to warn everyone.
In fact, if it is at normal temperature, it is fine, but if your car is parked outside in the hot noon sun, you need to think again. That's right! Just a seemingly harmless bottle of water, but your car can literally turn into a... train.
The reason is that water bottles usually have a spherical surface and are made of transparent plastic. If it contains water inside, the bottle has the ability to become a converging lens. At noon, the temperature inside the car can reach nearly 60 degrees Celsius. The sunlight from the window shining through the bottle will converge on one point and push the temperature even higher.
Many people said that putting a bottle of water on the seat is a habit they have had, but they never thought that the consequences of this would be so serious. Not only that, according to the opinion of some car experts, leaving a bottle of water on the passenger seat also poses another risk, which is the possibility of the bottle rolling out of position and falling on the accelerator, brake pedal, especially the brake pedal. At the time when the driver needs to brake suddenly and the water bottle rolls down, pressing the brake pedal hard, it will be extremely dangerous.
Also related to the water bottle left in the car, a previous study showed that drinking water from a plastic bottle left at a high temperature for a long time can cause unpredictable harm to health.
Notably, this study also specifically emphasized the case of water bottles that have been left for months behind the driver's seat, when getting in the car and feeling thirsty, they take them out to drink. This small action, although seemingly normal, is actually destroying health every day.
Specifically, according to this study, when the outside temperature is between 80 degrees F (27 degrees C) - 100 degrees F (38 degrees C), the temperature inside the car, if there is no air conditioning to reduce the temperature, can reach the threshold of 130 degrees F (54 degrees C) to 172 degrees F (77 degrees C). This is even higher than the “low” temperature of an oven.
According to a study from the American Academy of Pediatrics, in conditions of increasing temperature over time, the temperature difference is very small whether the car is closed or slightly open. In both cases, the temperature inside the car can rise to about 40 degrees Celsius within an hour, even when the outside temperature is only 22 degrees Celsius.
So, give up this habit before it is too late. Or if you want to leave water in the car, at least remember to cover it tightly, avoid leaving it in a place that is too exposed to the sun.
