Explosion Hazard of Sodium azide

Sodium azide is explosive and should be handled gently. Care should be taken to avoid grinding crystals trapped in ground glass joints and the threads of jars and bottles. It can also form highly explosive salts with many transition metals. This is of particular concern in one-step reactions involving in situ azide synthesis followed by a Huisgen 1,3-dipolar cycloaddition. Common reagents are both sodium azide and copper, from which highly explosive and shock sensitive copper azides can be produced.