Gasoline fume detection

[Larry]

I worked in my dad's gas station for many years as a kid in the 50s. Before the automatic hose shutoffs, we had to listen to the sound of the splashing to hear when the tank was getting full. That meant the ears and face were down right next to the filler tube and of course we had to keep breathing, and the smell of the vapors was unusual but not unpleasant. Tomorrow, I'll be 62 years of age and - knock wood, I'm still in good health! Maybe I was just lucky and then again, maybe the fumes are not as harmful as they are now made out to be!

[Doug Miller]

I'm not twisting your statements at all. You said that the hydrocarbons in gasoline were "pretty harmless" and that it was ok to drink them. Then you claimed you never said they were safe.

Now who's twisting your statements? This argument started when you falsely claimed that gasoline hydrocarbons were safe to drink. Your "pretty harmless" statement said _nothing_ about vapor.

They're not safe to drink either. Despite what you may think.

No, not like water. Water down the trachea kills by suffocation. Gasoline down the trachea is *poisonous* -- which means that a much smaller amount is deadly. Gasolone down the esophagus is poisonous also, but less dangerous there than down the trachea because it is not absorbed into the body as rapidly, thus providing more time for appropriate medical treatment. Untreated, it can kill you down the esophagus too.

-- Doug Miller (alphageek at milmac dot com)

How come we choose from just two people to run for president and 50 for Miss America?

[Richard J Kinch]

The hazard is aspiration pneumonia. This is not poisoning in the sense of a toxin that must accumulate in some dose. It is essentially a mechanical interference, not biochemical toxicity. Thus the similarity to water drowning: you can suffocate in hydrocarbon vapor, or liquid water, neither of which need be interfering on a chemical level with oxygen transport, just presenting a mechanical barrier the prevents air from reaching the alveoli.

Hydrocarbons are worse than water in effects like interfering with surfactant behavior in the lung tissue. Again, this works as an immediate physical problem from a sudden large aspiration, not a "poisoning" in the sense of small doses via vapor that can accumulate over long periods into a biochemical lethality.

[Doug Miller]

All of which is absolutely irrelevant to the point under discussion, which is that you made the false and dangerous claim that gasoline hydrocarbons are "harmless" and safe to drink.

-- Doug Miller (alphageek at milmac dot com)

How come we choose from just two people to run for president and 50 for Miss America?

[Richard J Kinch]

I stand by what I said. The hazard is in sudden aspiration of a significant quantity causing pneumonia. Not by swallowing into the stomach, nor in inhaling minor vapor concentrations into the lungs. Suffocation from high-concentration vapors is possible, but this is due to oxygen displacement and not poisoning.

Gasoline is dangerous, but not the way most people think. They see "harmful or fatal if swallowed" and wrongly assume it acts like, say, methanol, to poison biochemically via the bloodstream.

[Doug Miller]

Nobody disputed that anyway: everyone knows that inhaling gasoline is harmful.

Unfortunately you haven't yet figured out that swallowing it is, too.

-- Doug Miller (alphageek at milmac dot com)

How come we choose from just two people to run for president and 50 for Miss America?

[Richard J Kinch]

Sez you.

[Doug Miller]

My, what a witty retort. I haven't heard that one since, maybe, fourth grade.

It's pretty apparent, given your absurd claims, that you haven't figured that out yet. You _explicitly_stated_ that gasoline hydrocarbons were safe to drink, remember? That's how this argument started: you wrote that gasoline hydrocarbons were "pretty harmless" and that they could even be drunk, and I said that's bullshit. It was then, and it still is.

-- Doug Miller (alphageek at milmac dot com)

How come we choose from just two people to run for president and 50 for Miss America?

[Goedjn]

Tell you what, you just keep drinking gasoline for lunch, and the rest of us won't. that should work out well for everyone.

oh, and stop smoking.

[Richard J Kinch]

Yes, and I cited a leading medical authority (Merck Manual) explaining that the hazard is aspiration pneumonia incidental to swallowing, not the swallowing per se. You are free to cite otherwise.

Better yet, offer me money. I will drink a hydrocarbon.

[Doug Miller]

You provided a citation showing that aspiration of gasoline hydrocarbons is dangerous (which nobody disuputes), *not* a citation showing that drinking them is safe.

Any MSDS for those hydrocarbons will show otherwise.

No, thank you. I'd prefer not to have the consequences on my conscience. I'd be satisfied if you simply dropped this stupid claim.

-- Doug Miller (alphageek at milmac dot com)

How come we choose from just two people to run for president and 50 for Miss America?