So. A reagent that is expensive to isolate and purify, and is useful in a lot of industrial applications, is thrown away because no “public carrier” would transport it, eh? And just who transported it to the lake, and why couldn’t they keep on going until they got to a Dow or DuPont plant that could use the stuff?
Sorry, not your point, but the waste of that much reagent, just because some idiot was lazy and some other idiot wanted to see it go boom just pisses me off, even 65 years after it happened. Greatest generation my ass.
Plus even if it’s an alkaline lake to start with, things live there. Or did: I can’t imagine it was very hospitable after all that. Although a 1955 study mentions neither the sodium disposal nor any substantial differences between Lake Lenore and its neighbor, so it must not have been all that traumatic from an ecological perspective. Certainly by 1996 the lake was quite productive.
Sarah Goslee is a scientist, weaver, and writer, not necessarily in that order.
She spends far too much time chattering on Twitter, or you can email her at sarah dot goslee at gmail.
So. A reagent that is expensive to isolate and purify, and is useful in a lot of industrial applications, is thrown away because no “public carrier” would transport it, eh? And just who transported it to the lake, and why couldn’t they keep on going until they got to a Dow or DuPont plant that could use the stuff?
Sorry, not your point, but the waste of that much reagent, just because some idiot was lazy and some other idiot wanted to see it go boom just pisses me off, even 65 years after it happened. Greatest generation my ass.
/pedantic chemist
Good luck with the rest of the week.
I agree with you on all counts.
Plus even if it’s an alkaline lake to start with, things live there. Or did: I can’t imagine it was very hospitable after all that. Although a 1955 study mentions neither the sodium disposal nor any substantial differences between Lake Lenore and its neighbor, so it must not have been all that traumatic from an ecological perspective. Certainly by 1996 the lake was quite productive.
But it was an impressive explosion!