The Los Angeles Times reports worrying details on the tragic death of Sheri Sangji, a 23-year-old research assistant who suffered fatal third-degree burns after working with a pyrophoric liquid in a UCLA chemistry laboratory. The paper says that the Harran laboratory, where Sangji was working, had been safety checked a couple of months earlier and problems had been found.

Sangji died on 16 January, eighteen days after t-butyl lithium that she was syringeing from a bottle burst into flames, setting her clothes alight. The incident is under investigation by the California Division of Occupational Safety & Health (Cal/OSHA), and UCLA is conducting its own safety review.

According to the LA Times:

Two months earlier, UCLA safety inspectors found more than a dozen deficiencies in the same lab, Molecular Sciences Room 4221, according to internal investigative and inspection reports reviewed by The Times. Among the findings: Employees were not wearing requisite protective lab coats, and flammable liquids and volatile chemicals were stored improperly.

Chemical Safety Officer Michael Wheatley sent the inspection report to the researcher who oversees the lab, professor Patrick Harran, as well as to the head of the Chemistry and Biochemistry Department and a top UCLA safety official. The report directed that problems be fixed by Dec. 5. But the required corrective action was not taken, records show, and on Dec. 29 all that stood between Sangji’s torso and the fire that engulfed her was a highly flammable, synthetic sweater that fueled the flames.