chlorine gas is nasty

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jesse

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Jesse
My sister is in town and decided she didn't like the rate that the bathtub drains. I explained to her that it's actually an issue with the the drain-overflow assembly and not actually the pipe.

She didn't listen and bought some drain-o which she poured down the drain. She then decided that the bath tub wasn't clean enough and that toilet bowl cleaner would be a good way to clean it. Big ****ing mistake.

I was in the other room and smelled the gas which is hard not to notice. It is painful to breath in. Walked into the bathroom and there was plunging the combination together generating all kinds of the gas. Told her that she just made a gas that can kill you.. "so that's why my lungs hurt!"

That stuff is no joke. Breathing afterwords was painful for several hours. It took many hours worth of the windows being open for it to clear out. Left the house for the night. She had never heard that you don't mix ammonia and bleach . sigh.
 
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Yes, it is nasty stuff. Glad both of you are Ok.
 
Damn, that sucks. Glad you're both ok.
 
I have seen that happen before in a public rest stop. The attendant had to seal off the bathroom and open all the windows. Needless to say an Exxon station got a visit shortly thereafter and all is well.

Chlorine is definitely not something you wanna be breathing. Glad everybody is OK. I would have shut the door and turned on the vent and waited a few hours before going back in there. Or if you paint and have a respirator you can use that to assist in the cleanup.

Glad all is well.
 
Jesse, your post contains two issues.

One, chlorine gas on it's own can be deadly. It takes only a very little amount of liquid to create a relatively massive gas cloud which will asphyxiate every breathing thing within the cloud. I'm talking of a few drops once they obtain std atmospheric pressure and temp forming a cloud of hundreds of square feet. Liquid ammonia acts the same.

Two, chlorine mixed with ammonia is also known as the 'housewife killer'. A common scenario is sanitizing and cleaning (reason for mixing the two reagents) in a confined space (like a bathtub) with the person unknowningly inhaling the fumes. Loss of conciousness follows and they fall into the lethal concentration.

Now that your sister knows better I strongly encourage her to tell all her friends of the dangers. Thank God she did not succumb.

EDIT: I was thinking of industrial concentrations. Common household liquids are diluted by the mfg. Still, the dangers persist.
 
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Richard said:
Jessie, your post contains two issues.

One, chlorine gas on it's own can be deadly. It takes only a very little amount of liquid to create a relatively massive gas cloud which will asphyxiate every breathing thing within the cloud. I'm talking of a few drops once they obtain std atmospheric pressure and temp forming a cloud of hundreds of square feet. Liquid ammonia acts the same.

Two, chlorine mixed with ammonia is also known as the 'housewife killer'. A common scenario is santitizing and cleaning (reason for mixing the two reagents) in a confined space (like a bathtub) with the person unknowningly inhaling the fumes. Loss of conciousness follows and they fall into the lethal concentration.

Now that your sister knows better I strongly encourage her to tell all her friends of the dangers. Thank God she did not succumb.
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Uhm. I'm fully aware of both. How does my post contain issues? She mixed bleech and ammonia and made chlorine gas. It's dangerous. It hurt. We left. Both points were said in my post. I knew what she made the moment it hit my lungs.
 
webdaddy said:
I would have shut the door and turned on the vent and waited a few hours before going back in there. Or if you paint and have a respirator you can use that to assist in the cleanup.

Glad all is well.
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I did that but by that point it was all throughout the house. I quickly opened all the windows and we left the house and grabbed a hotel.
 
Glad to hear you're both okay and lesson learned without someone being hospitalized or worse!
 
Even before loss of conciousness there will be burning irritation to soft tissues (eyes and respiratory system). Google the MSDS (Material Safety Data Sheet) for the symptoms and medical treatment.
 
jesse said:
Uhm. I'm fully aware of both. How does my post contain issues? She mixed bleech and ammonia and made chlorine gas. It's dangerous. It hurt. We left. Both points were said in my post. I knew what she made the moment it hit my lungs.
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I'm thinking he meant "issues" as in "things to be aware of", not "problems with your post"; those "things" being that both chlorine gas by itself, and also the mix of chlorine bleach and ammonia, can be hazardous, and are "issues" people should be aware of.

Glad you're both ok!
 
Jesse, I simply meant as a FYI. Somethings are so nasty one has little response time. Chlorine gas is one of them. I'm happy to hear you made the quick and correct response.
 
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Then term housewife killer is appropo. I lost my home room teacher back in high school from this type of thing.
 
One thing I've noticed with chlorine gas exposure is that it tends to get absorbed by your sinus tissues. It's likely that you and your sister will be smelling chlorine (especially after sneezing) for awhile.
 
Wow. Glad you guys are okay. HCl was used in the trenches is WW1. Nasty. :(
 
I'm hoping that the bugs/spiders didn't handle it well either. Maybe it was an effective bug bomb...
 
Good grief, Jesse. That's nothing to mess with. Glad you did the right thing, and quickly.

-Rich
 
Scary story. Glad you're both ok.

Gotta love her trying to be helpful around the house, that was pretty thoughtful. Getting killed trying to clean your tub, though, that would be a bit much.
 
Jack Spectre said:
One thing I've noticed with chlorine gas exposure is that it tends to get absorbed by your sinus tissues. It's likely that you and your sister will be smelling chlorine (especially after sneezing) for awhile.
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After I had started swimming in AAU and high school and through college, everything about me smelled like chlorine. Everything....
 
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