The mercury thermometer fell. A mercury thermometer is broken, what to do?

Almost every home has mercury thermometers, because they last longer than electronic ones. But the fact is that if you accidentally break this thermometer, you can incur various kinds of problems.

It is very easy to break a mercury thermometer, because it is extremely fragile. Sometimes parents give a thermometer to their children to measure their temperature, but the children, unknowingly, do not handle it very carefully and break it. Also, sometimes a thermometer can break if you squeeze it too hard.

Mercury vapor is very dangerous to human health, because it takes quite a long time for it to be eliminated from the body. They will accumulate in the human body for an extremely long time. Such a stable poisoning process will greatly affect health. Therefore, even in minimal doses, in the case of breaking a thermometer, this has a very large impact on a person, his health may be at risk.

Mercury vapor can weaken the immune system, and problems with the digestive and nervous systems may also occur. The stomach, skin, liver, and many other organs may be affected. If you do not collect the mercury balls in time, they can evaporate, and in this case it will be a little more difficult to remove mercury vapors from the apartment, and in such a situation they cause more harm to human health.

If a mercury thermometer breaks in an apartment, you need to follow some recommendations:

Solution

If a child accidentally breaks a thermometer and the mercury was never found, there is no need to scold him, because in an identical situation the next time he will be afraid that he will be scolded and will not tell adults about this act, but will hide the thermometer himself. In this case, all family members may suffer. It is worth isolating this room and also keeping animals out, which can spread mercury throughout the house.

The child should leave the room; it is better to send him to fresh air. The room needs to be treated with bleach, this will help prevent the volatility of mercury vapor in the air. You should not try to collect mercury with a broom or vacuum cleaner, this will only make matters worse. It is better to report this to special services, because if mercury is not found, it is extremely difficult to cope with its influence.

Sometimes the thermometer breaks on the carpet. If you are dealing with a lint-free carpet, in this case you can sweep the fragments onto the cardboard with a brush, and also try to sweep away as much mercury as possible. What remains must be removed with a syringe.

In the video, what to do if you break a thermometer with mercury at home:

When the carpet is piled, and the mercury falls into the long pile, the efforts made to remove the mercury and thermometer fragments will be maximum:

• It is necessary to roll it from the edges to where the mercury and fragments are located.
• Then the carpet, wrapped in a large piece of film, should be taken outside to the place where carpets are usually beaten. You need to put the carpet on the ground, first laying a film there, bandage your face with gauze soaked in a soda solution, and also put on a respirator. Then you need to knock out the carpet and leave it to air.
• The film on which drops of mercury are found should be rolled up and placed in a bag, so that later it can be handed in along with the thermometer.

If the thermometer breaks on a bed, in an apartment or in a room at home you need to wipe the room with a solution of potassium permanganate, carefully collect the bed linen, and then hand it over to the service for processing. Under no circumstances should you vacuum, because in this case the vacuum cleaner will need to be thrown away. You need to ventilate the room and also not enter it for a while.

If a thermometer is broken by a pregnant woman, you should not deal with this problem yourself, because this can harm the unborn child. It will be better if the woman leaves the room so that someone else can remove the mercury and thermometer or call special services. You need to thoroughly remove the mercury, wash the floor with a solution of soda or manganese, then get rid of the mercury using a syringe and a glass jar. Be sure to ventilate the room and avoid visiting it for several weeks.

When a mercury thermometer breaks, the most important thing is not to panic, it is important to get together and start correcting this situation. You should call a special service, or deal with the problem yourself (at home), but be extremely careful so as not to increase the scale of the problem. In order to ensure that there are no mercury balls left in the apartment, you should check everything very carefully, every depression and recess in the floor, otherwise you can miss a certain amount of mercury, which will lead to certain consequences.

Video shows what to do when a child breaks a thermometer:

If a thermometer with a mercury tip breaks in your home, you need to implement a clear algorithm of actions to neutralize the dangerous substance. The main thing is not to panic, because the situation, although unpleasant, is not catastrophic; this happens in every family.

It will not hurt anyone to read this article - you will be prepared for such a domestic emergency. And one more thing - have a conversation with your household, especially children, and explain that if one of them breaks the thermometer - you cannot hide it, you should immediately tell an adult or call the Ministry of Emergency Situations.

What is the danger of a broken thermometer?

Mercury, which is contained in the tip of a thermometer, is a substance hazardous to health. Dangerous are mercury vapors, which, in the case of a developed thermometer, enter the human respiratory system. Wrong actions, unfortunately, can lead to small balls of mercury remaining in the room for a long time and poisoning the air.

The danger of a broken mercury thermometer is that very mobile mercury balls can easily get stuck in the crack, roll into the far corner of the room, they will not be visible and will be extremely difficult to get out. It is these small balls that will then evaporate toxic poisonous fumes.

Mercury evaporates at a temperature of 18 C, poisonous fumes enter the body mainly through the lungs (80%). With large evaporation, when there is a large leak of metal, mercury vapor penetrates the body through the mucous membranes and through the pores of the skin, primarily affecting the central nervous system, kidneys, and gums.

Mercury is most dangerous for children and pregnant women:

• Changes in kidney and lung function may occur in children
• Pregnant women are at risk of intrauterine damage to the fetus due to chronic exposure to mercury.

So, the mercury thermometer has broken, what should you do?

If in a panic you have forgotten everything you read about in our article, dial the number of the Ministry of Emergency Situations (by phone 01 or 112, if you are calling from a mobile phone) or the sanitary service and strictly follow their instructions. If you are able to cope with the problem yourself, then to assemble a broken thermometer, you should do the following:

• Remove people and animals from the room where the “accident” occurred and close the door tightly.
• Prepare:
  • a saturated solution of potassium permanganate, as well as a soap-soda solution;
  • a jar (preferably three-liter) with a tight lid, which is filled 2/3 with cold water or potassium permanganate solution;
  • 2 sheets of paper;
  • syringe or medical bulb;
  • a piece of cotton wool or a brush;
  • knitting needle or awl;
  • tape or adhesive tape;
  • flashlight.
• Wear rubber slippers (but not fabric ones), which you don’t mind throwing away, or put plastic bags on your feet.
• Put a wet gauze bandage on your face (or adapt a piece of cloth) to protect your lungs, as well as rubber gloves on your hands (preferably medical, tight-fitting - it will be inconvenient to perform delicate manipulations in household gloves).
• Soak a rag in a strong solution of potassium permanganate and lay it on the threshold of the room where the thermometer broke.
• Close the door tightly behind you and open the window. At the same time, windows in other rooms must be closed.
• Pick up the thermometer and everything that is left of it, being careful not to scatter the mercury remaining in the tip, and place it in a jar of water.
• Carefully roll small balls of mercury into one large one (they will merge) using sheets of paper.
• Push large balls onto a sheet of paper using cotton wool and pour them into a jar of water.
• After the mercury balls visible to the eye have been collected, you should collect the small ones using tape by gluing it to the surface where the thermometer broke. After processing, the tape should be placed in a jar of water.
• Using a flashlight, examine all the cracks and places where balls of mercury could have rolled (they will glow with a metallic color). Mercury is removed from hard-to-reach places using a sharp thin object (knitting needle) or sucked into a bulb or syringe.
• Place a syringe or bulb with mercury in the jar as well.
• If mercury could roll under the baseboard, it should be dismantled and the mercury collected using the above methods.
• Close the jar with a lid.
• Wash the floor and surfaces where mercury was collected with a solution of potassium permanganate or a soap-soda solution (you can do the first, then the second);
• Remove clothing, gloves, mask, shoes or bags and place everything in a separate bag, tying it tightly. Next, proceed with the clothes as described below.
• Call the Ministry of Emergency Situations and find out where you can hand over the jar with dangerous contents, as well as all items that have been or could have been in contact with mercury (gloves, a bulb, cotton wool, a floor rag, your clothes and shoes, etc.).
• Take a shower and rinse your mouth with soda solution.

Your actions must be careful, but at the same time, you cannot stretch out the most dangerous part of demercurization - the collection of mercury - for hours. For the next 7 days, try to exclude people and animals from staying in this room, constantly ventilate it, eliminating drafts. Every day it is necessary to wash the floor and surfaces that have come into contact with mercury with a soap-soda solution or water with the addition of a chlorine-containing disinfectant.

What absolutely should not be done if you break a thermometer:

• A broken thermometer, collected mercury, materials you used to collect metal, or even if the thermometer broke and the mercury did not leak out - you should not throw it into the garbage chute, sewer, or trash container.
• If you followed the algorithm and put everything in a jar of potassium permanganate, this jar also cannot be thrown into the above places - mercury is not neutralized, this is only a temporary measure until disposal in a specialized organization.
• Do not use a broom, rag or vacuum cleaner to collect mercury.
• You cannot wash clothes in a washing machine and shoes that you wore while collecting mercury; they should be handed over to the Ministry of Emergency Situations.
• Until all sources of evaporation have been collected, it is impossible to create a draft in the apartment.

Popular questions and answers to them

What should I do if the mercury thermometer broke, but at the same time I was wearing expensive clothes that could come into contact with mercury, but I feel sorry for throwing them away?

If clothing has been in contact with mercury, it should be placed in a bag and hung outdoors to air. Naturally, not on the balcony, where you often go out and will breathe mercury vapor. It can be in the attic of a summer house, in a barn, etc. Clothes should be aired for about 3 months, and then washed several times in a soap-soda solution.

What to do if the thermometer breaks on the carpet, mercury balls fall on soft toys or on the bed?

Collecting mercury from carpet becomes much more difficult. Most likely, you will have to part with the carpet and toys and take them for disposal, and without delay, but immediately after cleaning. If things are dear to you and it’s a shame to throw them away, you should do the same as described above with clothes. After weathering, the carpet and toys should be dry cleaned. It’s worse if the thermometer breaks on a bed, on upholstered furniture, or on bed linen, then it should be aired out for 3 months; if the furniture was not covered with anything, then it’s better to take it out to the garage, barn, or country house for 3 months.

If mercury from a broken thermometer gets onto a hot heating radiator, can I clean the room myself using the above algorithm?

No, in this case you should immediately leave the room, close the door tightly and call the Ministry of Emergency Situations. Mercury already boils at 40 C, so in this case all the mercury that gets on the radiators will end up in the air.

Which categories of persons are prohibited from contacting mercury?

Children under 18 years of age, elderly people over 65 years of age, pregnant women and persons with pathologies of the nervous and urinary systems.

My child swallowed mercury from a broken thermometer. What to do?

You must go to an emergency room so that your child can be examined by a doctor. You cannot be poisoned by eating mercury, but the child must be examined (in addition to mercury, a piece of glass from a broken thermometer could have gotten into the gastrointestinal tract).

Household members broke the thermometer and collected the mercury with a vacuum cleaner. What to do in this case?

This is a terrible mistake that results in the mercury being dispersed into tiny pellets and released into the air through the outlet of the vacuum cleaner's filter system. It is necessary to carry out demercurization according to the algorithm, and dispose of the vacuum cleaner or remove the filter, bag and remove the corrugated hose, which should be scrapped - you will have to say goodbye to these components. The vacuum cleaner should be left to air for several months outdoors.

The child broke the thermometer in the bathroom and carefully washed the mercury down the drain with a stream of water. Can mercury poison a room if left in the sewer?

Of course, such actions are unacceptable, but since mercury is heavier than water, it is washed off and goes with wastewater into the city sewer. If there are elbows in the sewer system of your apartment, mercury will easily settle there. Therefore, the knees should be disassembled and checked for the presence of mercury balls; if any are found, they should be poured into a jar of potassium permanganate, which should be disposed of.

Precautions when handling thermometers

• Buy an electronic or infrared thermometer: it is no less accurate, but absolutely safe.
• When taking children's temperatures, press firmly on the child's hand
• Don't give it to children
• Carefully record the readings on it, away from hard objects to avoid a sharp blow.
• Should be stored in a special plastic case.
• If it breaks, be sure to collect everything according to the recommendations and dispose of it properly.

Mercury is very dangerous and toxic and should not be allowed to enter the body.

What are the dangers of mercury?

Mercury is a very toxic substance. When it enters the body, it settles and accumulates in almost all internal organs and affects the circulatory, respiratory, digestive and nervous systems, causing mercury poisoning - mercury. The consequences of mercury poisoning can be psychological disorders.

This substance is especially dangerous for children and pregnant women.

It is not mercury itself in liquid state that is dangerous, but the vapors it releases. But the substance will begin to evaporate even at room temperature (18 degrees).

Small droplets of mercury can penetrate cracks in the floor, furniture, parquet joints, and can get stuck in the carpet pile. If you breathe fumes for a long time, you will be subject to chronic poisoning.

What to do if a mercury thermometer breaks?

Remove everyone, including pets, from the room or area where the mercury was spilled.

Open a window in the room, but leave the door and windows in other rooms closed so that under no circumstances there was no draft.

It is best to call a specialist who has the necessary equipment to determine the level of mercury in the air and find its residues in hard-to-reach places.

For the person who will collect mercury, prepare a gauze bandage, tape, a large jar of water that can be closed with a tight lid, a syringe (enema), paper, and, if available, shoe covers and rubber gloves.

Also make a solution of potassium permanganate with vinegar.

How to properly collect mercury?

• Wear a gauze bandage and gloves, and shoe covers if available.
• Collect the broken pieces from the thermometer and place them in a jar of water.
• Using paper, group the mercury particles in one place.
• Use a syringe to suck up the mercury balls and carefully pour them into a jar of water. Place the used pear in a jar of water.
• Collect the remaining small particles using tape - just stick pieces of adhesive tape on the place where the mercury spilled. Also throw the used pieces of tape with remaining mercury into a jar of water.

After all the mercury particles have been collected, secure the lid tightly to the jar. After completing all procedures, the jar will need to be taken to a mercury collection point.

The floor and other surfaces that have been exposed to mercury must be treated with a solution of potassium permanganate. Please note that this solution may stain, but this procedure is necessary to protect you and your family. You will have to treat surfaces with potassium permanganate frequently, even several times per knock, throughout the week.

Ventilate the room in which the thermometer has broken as much as possible.

What not to do

In no case Do not collect mercury with a vacuum cleaner. It will not only settle on its walls, but will also be sprayed along with the air that the vacuum cleaner passes through itself. In addition, the vacuum cleaner will heat the mercury, which will lead to intense evaporation.

You can't sweep away mercury broom, this will only separate the balls into smaller particles. The same goes for the brush.

Never dispose of collected mercury in sewer or garbage disposal.

Do not open all windows and doors at once; you cannot create draft.
Do not wash clothes in which you have removed mercury in the washing machine. It needs to be ventilated for a long time, or better yet, get rid of these things altogether.

Symptoms of mercury poisoning

Among the symptoms of mercury:

• metallic taste in the mouth;
• headache;
• general weakness, fatigue, irritability;
• vomiting, nausea, upset stomach;
• cough, chest pain.

Has your mercury thermometer broken at home? The main thing is not to panic. If this unpleasant situation occurs, then it is necessary to clearly follow the steps to destroy the hazardous material. This can happen in every home, but it is not a disaster. You should always be prepared for various household emergencies. Children must be informed of the need in this case to notify adults or call the Ministry of Emergency Situations.

The dangers of mercury

Mercury is a highly toxic harmful substance and belongs to hazard class 1. The main poisons are vapors that, when entering the human body, gradually destroy it deplorably. When broken, small mercury balls can roll into cracks, corners, and under baseboards. Staying indoors for a long time, they will gradually evaporate, thereby harming all living things. Mercury volatilization occurs at a temperature of 18-19C, metal vapors enter through the lungs, as well as the skin and mucous tissues.

Affected areas:

• Central nervous system. There is a feeling of fear, insomnia, memory loss, depression and paralysis.
• The respiratory organs are the lungs and bronchi. There is a constant lack of air, shortness of breath, asthmatic attacks, and symptomatic bronchial contractions.
• Internal organs. In the kidneys, liver and thyroid gland, the insidious metal settles and accumulates gradually. The toxin slowly destroys every cell of all living things.
• It affects the placental barrier, threatening the intrauterine development of the fetus. Pregnant women are strictly prohibited from coming into contact with very harmful metal. If an unpleasant tragedy occurs with a thermometer, it is better to contact special services for the disposal of this substance.

Mercury vapor is dangerous because it is odorless and completely colorless. It can only be detected using a special device. At a temperature of 18 o C, the insidious metal begins to intensively evaporate into the atmosphere, entering the body, it is no longer removed from it. But in order to accumulate a large dose of heavy metal in the human body, you need to stay indoors for several months or even years. Excessive MPC concentrations threaten the development of severe chronic diseases and range from 0.001 to 0.004 mg/m3. Inhalation of about two grams of poison can lead to fatal intoxication.

Symptoms of poisoning

Depending on the dose of mercury vapor, poisoning can be acute or chronic. It should be understood that if there were very severe poisonings leading to death, then thermometers would no longer be produced. But still, cases of poisoning occur as a result of negligence and incorrect actions to destroy mercury balls.

Symptoms of acute poisoning:

• weakness, chills, weakness and malaise of the whole body, symptoms similar to acute respiratory disease;
• dizziness, cramping pain in the head and neck area;
• excessive salivation, bleeding gums;
• constantly nauseated, gag reflexes and diarrhea occur periodically;
• a metallic taste appears in the mouth.

In advanced forms, shortness of breath, continuous cough, heart pain and a sharp increase in temperature.

Symptoms of chronic poisoning:

• fever, nervous tic;
• choking, continuous cough with expectoration of blood and mucus;
• fear, irritability, photophobia and insomnia.

The degree of poisoning depends on the concentration of mercury vapor accumulations. All this will not happen if you make the right operational decision to dispose of the harmful substance.

Step-by-step action plan for mercury disposal

If a mercury thermometer breaks, you can immediately contact special services, for example, the Ministry of Emergency Situations. Confusion and panic will have a number of serious consequences. The measures to destroy a broken thermometer are not that difficult.

1. First of all, make oxygen available to the room by opening windows and possibly doors.
2. It is advisable to remove children, pregnant women and animals from the room where the thermometer broke.
3. Prepare a concentrated solution of potassium permanganate and a soda solution with the addition of any detergent.
4. Try to find a medical bulb or syringe, you can use any brush, tape, adhesive tape or tape.
5. Wear a mask, rubber or surgical gloves, shoe covers.
6. Carefully collect the fragments from the thermometer into a jar of water. You can try to drive small balls of mercury onto a sheet of paper with cotton wool; if that doesn’t work, then use an adhesive material (adhesive tape, tape). Inspect hard-to-reach places, crevices and use a bulb or syringe. Place everything collected in a jar of water.
7. Treat the floor and damaged surface first with a solution of potassium permanganate, and then with a soap-soda mixture. You can also use alkaline laundry soap or chlorinated products.
8. Place the mask, clothing, gloves and can with contents in a bag and dispose of it. There are paid waste disposal services, you can also contact the Ministry of Emergency Situations or independently take it outside the populated area to a landfill, burying all the collected equipment.

After cleaning, treat the oral cavity with soda water and take water procedures. You can take any adsorbents, such as activated carbon or smecta.

For the first two weeks, daily ventilation and treatment of floors with soap or chlorinated solution is mandatory.

Prohibitory actions:

• If you use a vacuum cleaner, the mercury will begin to actively evaporate and be thrown out, resulting in a monstrously toxic mixture. The toxin settles inside, and in the future, when the vacuum cleaner operates, particles of the insidious metal will be sprayed throughout the apartment or house.
• Use a broom, broom and dustpan, as the mercury balls will be firmly attached between the small ears.
• Throw away the broken thermometer in a general trash can, garbage chute, or on the street.
• Rinse mercury beads down drains.
• It is strictly forbidden to create drafts until the mercury of the broken thermometer is removed.
• Contact clothing cannot be washed in a washing machine or by hand; it must also be subject to mandatory disposal.
• Efficiency and speed of correct decisions will protect loved ones and all household members from negative consequences.

Objective advantages of a mercury thermometer

In our modern times, electronic and digital technologies are increasingly developing, displacing previously created objects. But there are also irreplaceable things that are simple and convenient in everyday use. The well-known mercury medical thermometer, which remains the most common human body temperature meter, has had a long service and benefit from year to year. Due to its high parameters, the indicators are considered the most accurate and reliable. At the same time, the thermometer is not subject to the negative influences of various third-party factors. The design is as simple as possible and easy to use. Compared to electronic and digital goods, a mercury thermometer has a priority advantage in the price category.

Despite the wide selection of thermometers - mercury, electronic and infrared, non-contact and contact, disposable and with replaceable attachments, many prefer to use a traditional thermometer. The unreliable and fragile design of the case makes it easy to break the thermometer, which will inevitably lead to contamination of the room with toxic mercury. How to properly clean if it breaks in a living room?

If a person understands the danger posed by toxic fumes, he will try to carefully collect droplets of the substance and take all necessary actions to protect himself and others. As a last resort, he will invite specialists who will do this for a fee. But there is another path that most of our fellow citizens choose: collect visible droplets of mercury, throw them in the trash or toilet and no longer think about the thermometer and its contents.

Is it possible to poison the air in the entire apartment with one broken thermometer?

If a thermometer in an apartment breaks and the visible balls are removed, less than 1 gram of mercury will evaporate in a few months (provided the apartment is large and has good ventilation) without causing significant harm to the health of the residents. However, with prolonged exposure to even relatively low concentrations (hundredths and thousandths of mg/m3), signs of chronic poisoning appear. Fatal intoxication occurs when 2.5 grams of mercury vapor is inhaled. With timely cleaning of the premises, the concentration of vapors in the internal air of the apartment drops by 5-10 times.

What not to do if the thermometer breaks

Quite often on the forum there are stories of those who tried to independently collect the mercury from a broken thermometer, even called the medical service and, in the end, were left alone with the spread mercury. Here are their stories:

“My husband accidentally broke the thermometer and threw the mercury into the toilet, but naturally, it didn’t wash away, and floated on the bottom of the surface for several days.”

“I broke the thermometer, put it in a jar and called the Ministry of Emergency Situations, they told me to throw the jar in the trash, and put a plate of iodine in the place where the mercury had spread. Then a metallic sheen appeared on the surface of the iodine.”

“The thermometer broke on the TV remote control. They immediately rolled a large drop into a thermometer case with their hands, later they found another speck of dust, collected it on paper and threw it into the toilet. Having read horror stories on the Internet, we fished out droplets from the toilet with a syringe, then began crawling along the floor looking for small particles with a flashlight. As a result, everything collected from the syringe spilled onto the floor (mercury, unlike water, does not stay in the syringe) and broke into tiny droplets. We spent half an hour collecting them with tape (without much success) and with wet rubber gloves (better). Cleaned the floors with baking soda. At the bottom of the bucket they found some more tiny droplets. They ventilated the room and went to bed there. I think that we didn’t really remove anything with a rag with a soap and soda solution, but rather rolled the mercury into the cracks in the floor between the tiles and the debris.”

A vacuum cleaner won't help.

After this procedure, a regular vacuum cleaner can no longer be used for its intended purpose due to severe contamination. Washing vacuum cleaners can only be restored after thorough washing with special solutions.

When collecting with a vacuum cleaner, the concentration of vapors increases sharply, and without protective equipment you can get noticeable poisoning.

We decided to collect mercury ourselves

It is useful to have a demercurization kit in your home medicine cabinet to neutralize household mercury contamination. Such a kit will help eliminate contamination that occurs when small amounts of metallic mercury are spilled or when instruments, devices and products are destroyed. Usually the kit comes with detailed instructions. The kit can be purchased at a pharmacy. If you decide to collect mercury yourself, you need to prepare for this process.

To collect you will need:

• rubber seals;
• table lamp with extension cord;
• a jar with a tight lid filled with water (or a solution - 2 g of potassium permanganate per 1 liter of water);
• ordinary brush;
• rubber bulb;
• paper envelope or bag;
• adhesive plaster;
• wet newspapers;
• rags (rags);
• iodine solution.

It is forbidden

• touch mercury with bare hands without rubber gloves;
• throw the collected material into the sewer and garbage chute;
• sweep the mercury with a broom or use a vacuum cleaner;
• create a draft when ventilating the room;
• When washing clothes that may have come into contact with mercury, it is best to throw them away immediately.

You should start collecting mercury with the largest drops

The first thing you need to do if a thermometer (fluorescent lamp, energy-saving light bulb) accidentally breaks in your apartment is not to panic. Pull yourself together and get ready to work.

It is necessary to limit the access of family members to the room where the device crashed (close the doors) in order to prevent the spread of mercury and the spread of vapors into adjacent rooms of the apartment.

Cover the area where the mercury has scattered with wet newspapers, and lay a rug soaked in a solution of potassium permanganate at the entrance.

Open the windows to allow fresh air to enter and lower the temperature in the room (the warmer the apartment, the more active the evaporation of metal occurs).

Carry out a thorough inspection of things and surfaces on which drops of mercury may have fallen. All contaminated items should be placed in plastic bags and removed from the premises.

You can collect drops of mercury using a rubber bulb, a brush and thick paper sheets, previously bent on one side. To roll drops onto a sheet of paper, you can use a knitting needle or a thick needle. By moving the drop with a piece of paper, it can be connected to other drops, and then one large drop can be transferred to a jar. To make the drops better visible, the surface where the mercury has spread should be illuminated from the side with a table lamp. You can also use pieces of plaster to collect the smallest drops. Place the patch with the adhering drops in a jar. You can try to remove some drops from the cracks with a knitting needle with a cotton swab moistened with a solution of potassium permanganate or a disinfectant wrapped around it. A tampon with adhering drops is also placed in a jar. It is convenient to remove mercury from the cracks using a medical syringe with a thick needle. As soon as the mercury has entered the syringe, it must be carefully poured into a jar. If there is a suspicion that it has fallen under the baseboard, they must be removed without fail. Collection can take a long time, so you should take breaks every 10-20 minutes and go out into the fresh air. After glass fragments from the thermometer and visible droplets of mercury have been collected, you need to clean the contaminated surface using a specially prepared solution.

In the future, daily wet cleaning of the room (washing the floor with a chlorine-containing preparation or a soap-soda solution (4% soap solution in a 5% aqueous soda solution)), regular and intensive ventilation are required.

Those who have unsuccessfully tried to find out by phone to the Ministry of Emergency Situations where you can donate mercury from a broken thermometer are advised to bury the jar somewhere away from your home or leave it near the trash can. The best option is to hand over the jar of collected mercury to representatives of the district department of civil defense and emergency situations, who are obliged to accept it and completely unreasonably refuse to do so.

Protect yourself

After the mercury has been collected and disposed of, it is necessary to:

• wash gloves and shoes with a solution of potassium permanganate (potassium permanganate) and a soap-soda solution;
• rinse your mouth and throat with a faint pink solution of potassium permanganate (potassium permanganate);
• brush your teeth thoroughly;
• take 2-3 tablets of activated carbon.

Danger of poisoning

The most dangerous situations for human health are when mercury gets on upholstered furniture, carpet, children's toys, clothes, or rolls under the baseboard or into the cracks of the parquet; was not collected, and it was carried on the soles of slippers throughout the apartment. Mercury is a substance of hazard class I (according to GOST 17.4.1.02-83), a thiol poison. It is not mercury itself that is dangerous, but the compounds it forms. When entering the body in elevated concentrations, it has the ability to accumulate in internal organs: kidneys, heart, brain.

The main symptoms of mercury poisoning (if it enters through the esophagus) are immediately visible - bluishness of the face, shortness of breath, etc. In such a situation, first aid must be provided - induce vomiting in the patient and call an ambulance as soon as possible. A serious danger is posed by mercury that remains undetected; it poses the greatest danger because it enters the body by inhaling vapors. Intoxication occurs mainly through the respiratory tract. When inhaling mercury vapor, about 80% is retained in the body.

Acute poisoning with mercury salts manifests itself in intestinal upset, vomiting, swelling of the gums, a decline in cardiac activity is noted, the pulse becomes rare and weak, and fainting is possible. Chronic poisoning with mercury and its compounds results in a metallic taste in the mouth, loose gums, severe salivation, mild irritability, and weakened memory. The likelihood of such poisoning exists in all rooms where mercury is in contact with air. Particularly dangerous are the smallest drops of spilled mercury that have clogged up under baseboards, linoleum, in floor crevices, in the pile of carpets and upholstery. The total surface of small mercury balls is large, and evaporation is more intense. If mercury balls fall on heated floors, evaporation is significantly accelerated.