If it was 54 litres of highly concentrated HF, and they handled it without knowing what it was, then surely police would have been looking for a crater, not a guy with burns?
I really hope it was dilute stuff. It shouldn't be possible to steal 54 litres of concentrate that easily — think how bad it would be if some terrorist crop-dusted a town with the stuff!
I spent a summer in a chemicals bulk-to-lessbulk place between school and uni. There was quite a range of dangerous stuff there protected by not much more than a few cheap padlocks. Concentrated acetic, sulphuric, nitric acids in large carboys. A massive tankful of concentrated ammonia. Various powdered stuff in half- and full- hundredweight sacks. Mind you that was a little over 30 years ago now, I expect The Rules got tightened up a bit since then.
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(no subject)
Date: 2004-08-08 09:03 am (UTC)I really hope it was dilute stuff. It shouldn't be possible to steal 54 litres of concentrate that easily — think how bad it would be if some terrorist crop-dusted a town with the stuff!
(no subject)
Date: 2004-08-08 01:30 pm (UTC)There was quite a range of dangerous stuff there protected by not much more than a few cheap padlocks. Concentrated acetic, sulphuric, nitric acids in large carboys. A massive tankful of concentrated ammonia. Various powdered stuff in half- and full- hundredweight sacks.
Mind you that was a little over 30 years ago now, I expect The Rules got tightened up a bit since then.