I have no experience with the alkylmercury cmpds, but lots with the metal.
Now I'm very cautious about Hg, and I work so that any spill will be contained. I keep the metal under water, hoping that cuts down on surface
vaporization.
But Hg must not be as toxic as everyone thinks. Years ago I worked in a lab where we did gasometric analysis with elaborate glassware filled with Hg.
Someone was always raising a leveling bulb too rapidly and breaking a stopcock clean off the top of the gas burette. A stream of Hg would go flying.
NONE of this was in a hood. We cleaned the Hg by swishing it around in a big steel basin of soapy water with ungloved hands. This was not an
atypical situation in those days and no one got sick. Many others can tell similar stories of days gone by.
And of course kids were forever bringing Hg to school and almalgamating pennies with it and everything else imaginable. Nowadays that's a major
HAZMAT. Didn't seem to hurt us.
So like I said, I'm very careful nowadays and I fear spills greatly. But I think the hazards are over-rated. I'm much more fearful of soluble Pb
cmpds. |