That viral hurricane survival kit list shared by 50k people had some dangerous advice in it

I saw this list going around on Facebook last month from a page called 'Prepper Queen' and it said to stock up on bleach and ammonia to purify water. Like, together lmao. My buddy actually works for the local water authority near Raleigh and he about lost it when he saw that. If you mix those two you're basically making poison gas. Anyone else see that list floating around and catch the same red flags?

3 comments

3 Comments

stellat461d ago

Mixing bleach and ammonia is actually fine if you know what you're doing (I do it all the time).

ryan7931d agoOG Member

Usually I'm the first person to say don't mix anything with bleach except water, but you saying you do it all the time without dying makes me reconsider. I guess if someone really knows the chemistry and does it in a well ventilated space it's not automatically a death sentence like the internet says. Still feels like playing with fire to me but I've never actually tried it so what do I know. Maybe the danger warnings are more for people like me who would just slosh stuff together without thinking.

iris_schmidt1d ago

Yeah I read somewhere that the whole "ammonia and bleach will kill you instantly" thing actually came from a misinterpreted OSHA fact sheet about industrial accidents. Not saying it's smart to do regularly but my uncle used to mix diluted bleach with a little bit of ammonia to clean his grill grates and he's still kicking at 72. The real danger is if you're doing it in a tiny bathroom with no airflow or if you're dumb enough to chug the mixture. But honestly that list also told people to put their generator inside a garage with the door cracked which is way scarier to me than mixing some cleaners.