Half life of specific tear gas molecules?

Submitted ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨aldalire@lemmy.dbzer0.com⁩ to ⁨chemistry@mander.xyz⁩

Hello Chemists. I was wondering what the half-lives are for certain tear gas molecules used in tear gas used by the police. My house was tear gas due to an incident with a neighbor 5 days ago and now it still lingers.

They said that they used CN, OC and CS gas.

CN = (Orthochlorobenzalmalononitrile) OC = (Oleoresin Capsicum) CN = (Chloroacetophenone)

Thanks a lot for your help. Also, if you could note special properties of these molecules, about toxicity, etc, please let me know too :-)

Thank you!

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themoonisacheese@sh.itjust.works ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
generally tear gas dissolves in water to create irritants in your eyes. you can speed up the process by atomizing water with a spray bottle or a humidifier. they are also generally acidic, so adding a base to your cleaning agents should help neutralize them. try dissolving baking soda in your atomizer, and wipe surfaces with hot water + baking soda / bleach.

soap should also work well with these specific molecules, especially OC which is oil-based.

in my experience tear gas odor goes away after a week indoors ( with windows open during the day as normal person would do), but it tends to cling to surfaces. it might be worth wiping your walls, ceiling, and above cabinets and such.

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ProfessorOwl_PhD@hexbear.net ⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
CS gas has a half life of about 110 hours, so nearly 5 days. OC (pepper spray) is allegedly biodegradable, but the only information I could find about it is that there’s no known literature on how long it takes to biodegrade. CN gas I can’t find any information on a half life at all.

You really, really want to pay someone to clean it up, but if that’s not an option the absolute least you need for cleanup is a full hazmat suit. Everything in your house will need to be thoroughly cleaned, it’s not going to dissipate on its own.

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