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[BigRedDog]

I heard city fire ask central dispatch to do a call back this morning but hadn't paid much attention to it....

13ABC Toledo sent out a tweet about somebody finding an old broken blood pressure cuff behind the hospital...

http://www.13abc.com/story/17667779/2012/04/24/mercury-spill-reported-at-mercy-memorial-hospital-in-monroe-mi?utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=twitterfeed

[Baggins]

They mentioned this on the news this morning...Mercury is some nasty stuff to deal with...

You just got to face it, there is a layer of man made posion covering the Earth...

[Flanders]

You just got to face it, there is a layer of man made posion covering the Earth...

LoL!  Those pesky elements just seem to be everywhere in the Earth's curst these days..

[BigRedDog]

Another tweet from the MEN...

they say it was a box of broken thermometers that someone at the hospital probably just "threw away"...

seems to me someone at the hospital should have known better

http://www.monroenews.com/article/20120423/NEWS01/120429992

One of the first comments in the MEN article is about playing with the balls of mercury when we were kids...   I think I've mentioned this before on MT...   when we were kids we would crawl under the fence at a local Dow chemical pipeline pumping station that had something to do with their brine wells...    there would be gallons and gallons of mercury laying around on the ground.  We would roll it around to see who could make the biggest 'ball' out of it...

If it's so hazardous, how did all of us live this long?

[Chips]

Another tweet from the MEN...

they say it was a box of broken thermometers that someone at the hospital probably just "threw away"...

seems to me someone at the hospital should have known better

http://www.monroenews.com/article/20120423/NEWS01/120429992

One of the first comments in the MEN article is about playing with the balls of mercury when we were kids...   I think I've mentioned this before on MT...   when we were kids we would crawl under the fence at a local Dow chemical pipeline pumping station that had something to do with their brine wells...    there would be gallons and gallons of mercury laying around on the ground.  We would roll it around to see who could make the biggest 'ball' out of it...

If it's so hazardous, how did all of us live this long?

The mercury would sure make our silver coins shine too.
It was also a major factor in Obama's 2008 campaign.

[Baggins]

The mercury would sure make our silver coins shine too.
It was also a major factor in Obama's 2008 campaign.

Huh...?

[Baby Hitler]

The mercury would sure make our silver coins shine too.
It was also a major factor in Obama's 2008 campaign.

Huh...?

I"m going to hazard a guess here and say that when he was a kid, they would use mercury to shine up their silver quarters.

Regarding the other part of Obama's campaign, he's had a war against mercury for quite a while it seems.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/03/01/1069883/-Victories-in-President-Obama-s-Long-War-Against-Mercury

[livewire]

A box of broken thermometers?  Are you serious?

I wonder... what was the REAL threat to the public, with this box of thermometers? 
And what was the cost of the "clean up"?


I would bet that the answers are practically nil, and a whole lot of money, respectively.   

[Professor H]

For those who wonder the dangers - (and yes we played with it as kids as well)...

Long term exposure leads to symptoms that used to be ID's as the Mad Hatter's disease, since hatters used elemental mercury...

Exposure can lead to:

Symptoms of methylmercury poisoning  (organic - found in "foods")

In addition to the subtle impairments noted above, symptoms of methylmercury poisoning may include;

impairment of the peripheral vision;
disturbances in sensations ("pins and needles" feelings, usually in the hands, feet, and around the mouth);
lack of coordination of movements;
impairment of speech, hearing, walking; and
muscle weakness.

Symptoms of elemental mercury effects This instance and what we played with

Symptoms include these:

tremors;
emotional changes (e.g., mood swings, irritability, nervousness, excessive shyness);
insomnia;
neuromuscular changes (such as weakness, muscle atrophy, twitching);
headaches;
disturbances in sensations;
changes in nerve responses;
performance deficits on tests of cognitive function.

Symptoms of high exposures to inorganic mercury

Symptoms of high exposures to inorganic mercury include:

skin rashes and dermatitis;
mood swings;
memory loss;
mental disturbances; and
muscle weakness.

http://www.medicinenet.com/mercury_poisoning/page2.htm#effects

I wonder... what was the REAL threat to the public, with this box of thermometers? 
And what was the cost of the "clean up"?

Haz-mat cleanups are not cheap...

[BigRedDog]

A box of broken thermometers?  Are you serious?

I wonder... what was the REAL threat to the public, with this box of thermometers? 
And what was the cost of the "clean up"?


I would bet that the answers are practically nil, and a whole lot of money, respectively.   

As I stated above, I'm surprised hospital staff don't know how to properly handle a box of broken thermometers.  This can't be the only box like that in the hospital.  And I admit it is probably possible that someone just drove up and tossed their box of broken thermometers from home in the hospital dumpster. 

Seems like broken thermometers was one of the items that the public can dispose of at some of the County waste pickup sites...

And those are already funded

[Baby Hitler]

Symptoms of elemental mercury effects This instance and what we played with

Symptoms include these:

tremors;
emotional changes (e.g., mood swings, irritability, nervousness, excessive shyness);
insomnia;
neuromuscular changes (such as weakness, muscle atrophy, twitching);
headaches;
disturbances in sensations;
changes in nerve responses;
performance deficits on tests of cognitive function.

Symptoms of high exposures to inorganic mercury

Symptoms of high exposures to inorganic mercury include:

skin rashes and dermatitis;
mood swings;
memory loss;
mental disturbances; and
muscle weakness.

http://www.medicinenet.com/mercury_poisoning/page2.htm#effects


Haz-mat cleanups are not cheap...

I'm thinking some around here might bathe in the stuff daily.

[rwwjr]

Good call FB!!!