Bob Krell
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www.healthyindoors.com Vol. 7 No.11, Nov. 2019
H
i
E
arlier this month we reported on
a chemical incident at a Buffalo
Wild Wings restaurant in Mas-
sachusetts that sickened 13 and left
one employee dead. This tragedy was
the result of employees inadvertently
mixing chlorine and acid-based clean-
ing products together, which created
a toxic plume of gas.
As an indoor environmental consul-
tant for over 30-years, I have seen a fair
share of chemical-related horrors at a
number of client facilities. In one case,
a school kitchen worker dumped out a
bucket of a bleach solution into a sink
with a common grease trap that another
worker had just poured some excess
ammonia-based dish sanitizer concen-
trate into. The resulting off-gassing
caused severe respiratory damage to
that employee, and could have had a
fatal ending, as well.
The photo below is one I took many
years ago during some IAQ investigative
work at a medical office building. The
area with employee concerns had an
Alpine Air ozone machine (ugh) and a
tabletop humidifier unit. After (strongly)
suggesting that they lose the ozone
unit immediately, I inquired about how
they maintained the humidifier—did
they ever clean the reservoir tank, etc.?
The employee slides this box out from
under their desk and informed me that
they used these chemicals every week
to keep it "nice and clean!"
Failing to hide my shock, I blurted out
that I believed this sort of concoction had
been outlawed by the Geneva Conven-
tion after WWI. This is a classic example
of "what you don't know can indeed hurt
you." I have used this photo in literally
hundreds of presentations to illustrate
that point.
I must admit that even us industry pro-
fessionals may get lulled into sometimes
minimizing IAQ hazards after getting
inundated with sensationalized "Deadly
Toxic Black Mold" hype and similar ilk.
A word of caution, though—there are
numerous real hazards out there, some
with deadly consequences if we fail to rec-
ognize them. I personally don't subscribe
to using marketing scare tactics, but
sometimes they're warranted.
6 | November 2019
Bob Krell
Founder & Publisher
Indoor Air Quality Matters
It actually can be a matter of life and death.
