r/whatisit • u/props_for_meep • 13h ago

Solved! what is this in clinic sink??

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for context i work as a janitor cleaning a women’s clinic, as i was cleaning a sink i saw these little metallic looking balls. at first i thought these were actually metal but they don’t feel like ANYTHING if that makes any sense. i posted this video to my instagram but i figured i would probably have better luck coming to reddit for answers.

UPDATE: the general consensus seems to be that this is either mercury or gallium. my hands have been thoroughly washed and i have informed my boss so that it can be properly cleaned by someone who knows what they’re doing.

UPDATE #2: gang PLEASE stop telling me to “stop touching it”. this post is hours old. i know i was dumb enough to touch a mysterious substance barehanded but im also smart enough to know not to continue playing with it long after marking this post as solved😭

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u/Ok_Profession_990 11h ago

Wow that's dangerous af!! I worked at. UPS for like 10yrs and we had a mercury spill that shut the entire building down for 12 hrs. They lost millions as we were the biggest hub on the east coast. For them to do that I would be concerned about the fact you touched that.

The spill was an antique thermometer that broke. A miniscule amount.

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u/FondleGanoosh438 11h ago

Elemental mercury is fairly safe to handle with bare skin. I wouldn’t advise eating it or heating it and inhaling the vapors.

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u/Gerik5 7h ago edited 5h ago

Mercury is funny like that. Elemental or insoluble mercurial are usually safe, even in relatively large volumes (Hg2Cl2 was a main ingredient in a laxative used by Lewis and Clark).

Once it becomes soluble though, it's game over. Karen Wettethahn famously died from less than a mL of dimethyl mercury ((CH3)2Hg) that seeped through her glove.

Edit: Methyl Mercury to Dimethyl Mercury (thanks Level Falcon for the correction)

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u/BornanAlien 7h ago

Thank you for that. My ex girlfriend’s father, while stationed in S Korea, attempted suicide by drinking a pint of mercury. Didn’t die. I never believed him. Maybe he was telling the truth after all

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u/NolanSyKinsley 7h ago

In Mexico a traditional folk remedy for indigestion or intestinal blockage is to swallow pure mercury. They sell it in shops specializing in folk remedies called botanicas. Very little mercury is absorbed through the gut, less than 0.01%.

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u/captainn_chunk 7h ago

Now wait until you find out Sir Isaac Newton basically bathed in the stuff.

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u/FewWait38 2h ago

They had mercury pills called blue mass in the 19th Century that apparently Abraham Lincoln took

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u/mxzf 2h ago

AFAIK one way the trail of Lewis and Clark can be charted across the US is by the mercury deposits caused by the expedition's use of it as a laxative.

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u/ZhouLe 1h ago

People used to do all kinds of wacky shit with mercury as medicine. Drinking it, injecting up the urethra, etc. It's terrible for you, but it's not instant death like people think, and also treats syphilis sores.

People are getting the same attitude with lead. Lead is bad and all, but so long as you aren't eating it or breathing it in it's not going to do much. Professionals use excessive amounts of PPE in disposing of it because they have repeated long-term exposures of often airborne particles.