Kleinerkiffer-thank you. I felt the danger posed by this was of a nature separate from the drug, and that my posting a separate thread in reply was justified even to a closed thread, in spite of the rules of the site, because that thing there, if that was, at one point, ether, or an ether, it isn't now, and thats mostly peroxide/hydroperoxide or all of it is a mixture of the two after over six decades, and it quite literally, is a ticking time bomb with a hair-trigger powerful enough to blow somebody's head off (literally, as in 'red mist', not as in 'damn that got me high'), shatter every bit of glass in the room, certainly all the windows and leave a ragged torso-stump behind in its wake, IF the poor bastard to get near that thing is lucky. (questionable as to whether thats lucky or unlucky). A closed-coffin job for sure, if not being buried in a doggy bag of scrapings off the nearest wall remnants, and simply picking it up, could well set it off, and if that was ether, as given the smell reported it almost certainly is (the likes of hydrocarbons would not form solids like that, not the alkanes, ethylene is too volatile and hasn't been used in a long long long time as an anaesthetic, although could perhaps polymerize, its a gas at RT and chloroform wouldn't form solids like that either. Also the odor of chloroform is heavy, and sweet and almost sugary in a way. I'd say 95% to 99% certainty that is, or rather, at one point was, ether, and given use as a medical anaesthetic more probably than not, diethyl ether.
The peroxides they form are exquisitely sensitive. Hair trigger is if anything an understatement. If the OP tries to take off that cap, or even agitates it, or the bottle, it could, and quite probably would detonate with, looking at that thing, extraordinary violence. Not pretty in a glass bottle either. If it didn't take somebody's head off its shoulders in liquid form (the head, not the contents of the bottle) then they would, if close enough to touch it almost certainly be left blinded by the glass shard frag grenade the picture shows, filled with glass buckshot thats difficult to show clearly on X-ray, most likely pulverized in fine dust form (munitions like this, containing metal dust of dense metals like tungsten are used actually for very close-range area of effect, shockwave aside, lethal antipersonnel grenades, that spread a fine cloud of pulverized metal dust, which is ignited and shreds the target to pulp)
A glass version of that is just plain nasty and sadistic. There is no such thing, as a safe container of crusty old ether. Could go off on its own, very probably would go off if touched, will go off if opened, there is peroxide deposition all over the interior of the screw thread of the cap and that is a very common cause, with peroxidized ether, of the whole thing going up in a fireball and a shockwave.
I'm really NOT joking when I say this is a job for the professional emergency services. Do NOT attempt to dispose of this on your own. Don't even go near it. Christ, just looking at that thing makes me hold my breath and glance sideways at my fridge, with the 2 and a half liter jug of THF in there, the cans of diethyl ether, diisopropyl ether and other solvents, and bottle of iodine monochloride underneath. Those ethers however are VERY fresh. The THF bought a couple of weeks ago. But still, just looking at that thing is enough to make me nervous, and I'm safely likely a continent or two away
And right now, right the minute after I go have a piss and my morning oxy so my hands aren't shaking, I am going to go grab a potato, some lab filter paper discs, and some potassium iodide, make a solution and test each and every bottle, can and jug of ether, DIPE, THF, or 1,4-dioxane in this house. For the pictures posted, once you know what they are almost certainly containing, and the nature of the contents are a fearful sight to behold.
Treat that thing like an islamic suicide-bombing jihadist spitting cobra on steroids and a crack comedown strapped to your testicles with rusty razorwire , and do not so much as take god's name in vain (i'm not even religious, but christ damn (apologies there...although I don't THINK it can hear me from all the way over here...)....you want a few heavenly beings looking out for you with that fucker about!) within the building. Or it might just hear you. That thing was in my house? I would not be staying in it until it was disposed of.
There are bad drugs, and then there are bad drugs like PMA, and then there is this. This is, without exception THE most lethal looking example of a possible (at one time) psychoactive I have ever witnessed. At least most bad drugs only kill those who actually take them, not those who look at them and frown too hard. A lab absolutely would get evacuated if that thing was found, knowing it likely to have been ether, no question about it, and the area cordoned off.
Some poor bastards are going to have to take that out in padded suits, and require a diaper whilst doing so if they want to keep their underwear. I wouldn't want to be the bomb disposal guy doing that job. (wouldn't want to do that job at all mind you, but that? I'd suddenly decide to call in sick, cash in every vacation hour and bit of overtime pay I'd earned, and use it to run the hell in the opposite direction.
For those who want to treat ether responsibly, fresh, modern ether comes with inhibitors. Such as butylated hydroxytoluene or butylated hydroxyanisole (BHT and BHA respectively) which, although consumed as they do their job, inhibit peroxide formation and these are also used in food as additives, at least BHA is IIRC. And the quantities in inhibited ethers are small. This, given the age is almost certainly uninhibited, and quite obviously, peroxidation has run rampant. And as such, left a ticking time bomb/trip-mine with a particularly nasty ass attitude problem of a magnitude that would make an enraged saw-scaled viper look placid by comparison. For modern ethers-use the iodide test strip (KI or NaI can be bought on ebay) if your going to keep ethers around; keep them cold. Some copper powder or twists of bare strands of copper wire added can help decompose the peroxides as they form or inhibit peroxidation. Storage over (safest probably) calcium metal, BEFORE they are peroxidized (calcium metal is reactive enough to reduce the peroxides but not so reactive as to spontaneously ignite like sodium). Although the ether must be dried before its application in the case of Ca. will destroy peroxides IN NON-CRUSTY ETHER! Do under no circumstances AT ALL do anything to interact with a crusty old ether container in any way bar removing yourself, not it, from the vicinity, and then calling the emergency services to inform them of the nature of the problem, fire brigade, and tell them its a peroxidized ether hazard. Don't attempt to destroy the peroxides, don't attempt to move or even touch the container, just retreat, and have the bomb disposal folk in for it cannot be rehabilitated, just pray it does not go off when they move it and rip through your lab like an airstrike into a petrol refinery. If you are fortunate, it won't. If you aren't, then just be thankful for any equipment and reagents and indeed people who are not reduced to little pieces and hope the place ain't set ablaze creating a noxious fug of god only knows what, situation dependent kinds of toxic fumes. Get out, call help, stay out until the professional assistance is rendered and the situation made safe.
ANY sign of crusting that is not a verified, personally witnessed fall or spill of another material right before your very eyes, that is KNOWN not to be peroxidation. E.g spill a powder on a bottle yourself, and you know for a fact that the result is of course not peroxide formation, assume it to be dangerous. Ethers generally are highly flammable, volatile (this is part of the reason the peroxidation works itself into the bottle cap threads and on opening without it being known if not regularly tested to pre-empt this, results in friction which detonates the peroxide in the threads, and of course both disperses and ignites the ether in a fireball of burning vaporised solvent, like a fuel-air explosion, which can be devastatingly powerful, and as a secondary result with explosions propagating through dispersed flammable vapors in confined spaces like buildings the burning fuel consumes the oxygen in the area, temporarily creating an unbreathable, anoxic atmosphere. This phenomenon was responsible for the buncefield gas storage facility disaster, fuel-air explosion and the devastation was massive. big facility, big natural gas dispersal and then explosion and resultant collossal shockwave. Big. Fucking. Mess.
Keep your ethers cold, refrigeration slows down chemical reactions generally since reactions have a thermodynamic energy barrier to begin, save for compounds of inherent high instability with a negative figure for this value, which are, usually unstable explosives. But all chemical reaction is mediated by interactions between atoms or molecules or both, and for this to occur, they must be able to move from a place where both are not, to a place where both are, in the local microenvironment, in order that they interact. The higher the temperature the more energetic the movement, such as lower in a solid, than in a liquid than in a gas respectively, gas/vapor having the most kinetic energy of the individual discrete molecular/atomic entities. The higher the energy the more rapid a reaction occurs if that reaction can itself occur at all. Thus higher temperatures promote more rapid reactions and lower ones slow them down.
TEST TEST TEST TEST TEST! use iodide, sodium or potassium iodide (not iodine, iodide salts, hot alcohol with some water in to ease dissolution can be used to dissolve these safely they are not acutely extremely toxic, dissolve some, to a concentration that doesn't crystallize out in the paper obviously in methanol, ethanol or isopropanol (isopropyl alcohol) and also apply a solution of starch/suspension of starch, which can be easily made at home by boiling a load of potatoes and using the boiled down water to soak the same paper. There is a characteristic reaction between iodine, in the elemental state, although not with iodide itself. The reaction manifests as a blue-black coloration developed on the paper by reaction of iodine with the starch. For this to be seen one can take a piece of potato and a dropper with some iodine tincture in it, and applying a drop or two to a cut surface of the potato. Instant blue-black coloration appears within a moment.
This, is a safe reaction to demonstrate the color that a positive indicator paper (peroxide test strips can be bought too) will produce
upon reacting with ether(s) containing peroxides. The heavier the coloration, the greater the concentration of peroxide, and it must be treated, with a reducing agent which will destroy the peroxide/hydroperoxide content (the process involves an intermediate compound with a structure as follows: CH3-CH2-O-CH(OOH)-CH3 in the case of diethyl ether hydroperoxide) an ether itself has the structure R-O-R where R groups are alkyl or aryl, and the ultimate peroxide compound formed is of the structure (-CH(CH3)OO-)n, a polymerized version, also known, in the case of the prototypical ether peroxide, ethylidene peroxide.
The intermediate hydroperoxides are explosive, but tend towards deflagration (rapid burning, with gas evolution and subsequent pressure wave as it goes up, in flames) Gunpowder in fireworks, flashpowder in same, or as used in old school photography of the REALLY old kind does this when they go off.)
The alkylidene peroxides themselves, the vicious, unstable, nasty as hell made flesh end product of the polymerization reaction of the hydroperoxide intermediates however, undergo true detonation, the high-energy molecules fly apart into fragments, releasing tremendous energy and creating a short-duration, powerful, supersonic shockwave. A deflagrating explosive is known, typically, as a 'low explosive' like gunpowder, guncotton (nitrocellulose), flashpowders and various other fuel-oxidizer mixtures of the kind, whilst the term 'high explosive' refers to those compounds which undergo true detonation in the manner of their explosive decomposition. Some are more sensitive than others. For instance despite a large amount of destructive power, the mining (as in quarrying, rather than land-mining in the sense of a boobytrap which explodes when stepped on or driven on etc.) compositions like ammonium nitrate-diesel fuel (ANFO, ammonium nitrate-fuel oil) still produce an awful lot of energy when the charge is initiated, but the energy required to initiate it is also large, similarly many military modern plastic explosives if put into a fire will burn, but not explode, and need the detonation of a subset of HEs known as primary explosives, to supply the energy needed to induce them to detonate, from the energy supplied by the shockwave of the primary HE (High Explosive) propagating through the less sensitive plastic explosives used by militaries and the occasional terrorist dirtbag.
Primary HEs are those which detonate, not deflagrate, and which also have a low energy barrier required to cause them to do so.
Examples being the likes of lead azide, mercury fulminate, used in the primers of firearm cartridges to ignite the (low explosive) propellant (A HE in a firearm propellant charge would possess too much of a shattering effect (called 'brisance' a substance expressing this quality being termed 'brisant' and would cause way too much overpressure way too fast for the gun, cannon, mortar, howitzer or whatever sort of firearm projectile launcher employing an explosive propellant to survive without ending up as fragments of scrap metal shrapnel and reducing the cannon, pistol, rifle etc barrel to smithereens and wrecking it utterly. )
The primaries are sensitive, some more than others. At the absolute utter extremity, is a common lab demo, ammonium nitrogen triiodide, I won't go into how its made, but it is sometimes demonstrated as a measure of how sensitive a primary can be, and because it cannot, physically be prepared in a quantity, stored in a quantity or put into a device with which to do harm, tiny bits can be made, and they go off with the least provocation, or no provocation. It and probably nitrogen trichloride and nitrogen tribromide (the trifluoride on the other hand is more stable and is used in the semiconductor industry for etching silicon wafers in chip fabrication because of the great strength of the bond fluorine forms, unlike the other elements of the halogen series. The nitrogen trihalides other than fluorine are ultrasensitive, and at least the triiodide (and NCl3, NBr3 are even worse, nitrogen trichloride, an oily yellow liquid first discovered in 1812 by a chemist named Pierre Louis Dulong, and it cost him one of his eyes and two fingers when it promptly went and blew the fuck up, and the later chemists sir Humphry Davy, was temporarily blinded by NCl3 going off, and he hired the famous Michael Faraday as a co-worker. Both of them on further initial investigations into its chemistry and properties were injured in another explosion.
These trihalides of nitrogen, fluorine excepted are SO sensitive that even the impact of ALPHA PARTICLE RADIATION can initiate them and cause detonation, as can light, heat, a speck of atmospheric dust, contact with organics, friction, shock, and are AFAIK unique in that alpha radiation is sufficient energy to let the beast within off its leash and have it make an almighty bang.
Ethylidene peroxide (diethyl ether peroxide) and co aren't QUITE that sensitive. But thats really not saying much and they can and will detonate with extreme violence and great brisance from friction, from mechanical shock, electrostatic discharge, flame, not sure about light, I'd rather not find out either other than by reading about it in a book.
Some ethers are particularly prone to peroxidation and others less so. IIRC the gaseous cryogen dimethyl ether, does not undergo peroxidation, but it alone cannot, afaik. tert-butyl-methyl ether is much less prone to peroxidation than most ethers and is often used where an ethereal solvent is needed in the field of chemistry or other sciences. Although it is not fit for a drug. Plus it smells pretty shite too
However, some ethers, diisopropyl ether in particular is notorious for its tendency to peroxidize. Particularly, if I recall correctly, those ethers having a secondary carbon attached to the carbon which shares the oxygen bridge with the other 'R' aryl/alkyl group, peroxidize more rapidly than others. DIPE (diisopropyl ether, the ether formed from the dehydration and condensation of two isopropyl alcohol (ethers are formally derivatives of two alcohols or phenols and can be synthetically prepared from the corresponding alcohol/phenols) is particularly bad for it. DIPE must be peroxide-tested every three months minimum, whereas for diethyl ether (I.e the ether that most bluelighters would think of as 'hey, this was in fear and loathing...' or just 'ether' as is generally understood when referred to as a substance rather than category of substances amongst chemists to mean diethyl ether, C2H5-O-C2H5, the ether one would most likely inhale and/or take orally to intoxicate or anaesthetize on the other hand should be tested at minimum once a year. I test mine more often for the sake of thoroughness and safety. Better safe than blasted to bits, blinded, covered in full body burns et cetera, no? THF also peroxidizes more rapidly than diethyl ether although I still need to find out the minimum needed, so this can be at least halved (I.e tested twice as frequently, not tested half as much, more vigilance, not laziness) but until I do, I treat it like I do diisopropyl ether. In other words, 3 months mandatory minimum test schedule. Written records taken and kept. For each container.
More than 60 years and more solid than liquid? that is absolutely shocking. And indeed, if I were in the building, or worse the room, pants-beshittenly terrifying, that ain't crusty, that is CHUNKY. Good fucking god almighty.
then:
To the OP of this thread:
Do this, do this now. Take your family with you. Take the illegals outa the place, do NOT take the former ether with you, do not touch it, move it, or look at it askance. The ether peroxides are at some of the most sensitive and dangerous examples of the scale of sensitivity and danger posed by sensitive primary explosives. Sorry if you need new underwear. But better than needing a reincarnation, no? leave it where it is, and get out. Stay out until the poor sod pros in the armored hazard suits take that thing out and be thankful that its gone. Because that is one extremely dangerous medical relic. Its 'live' and its timer is ticking.
And do please post back to tell us when you have done so, and when help arrives what happened to follow, so we know your alright. And if you get to watch the thing from a distance being 'safely' blasted to bits, do tell us. 60 years plus....I've never heard of, let alone SEEN the like. And I hope never, ever to see such a sight in person. I know I won't in any of my ether, dioxane, THF etc. because of testing and destruction of peroxides. I was really surprised you know, just anecdotally, to see that in some brands of ether starting fluid for cold-starting car engines in bad weather here, in the UK, an (allegedly) first-world country now don't have just diethyl ether as the ether content, but some a mixture of diisopropyl and diethyl ether and pretty sure I've seen one that was a mixture of diisopropyl ether and other solvents like acetone, naphtha, toluene or xylene and such. Possibly even one just diisopropyl ether and heptane plus some cylinder lubricant oil, but can't remember for sure. Diethyl ether would be far safer. There was even a label on the back saying 'warning, may form explosive peroxides in storage. Beats me why its sold in such a product (DIPE). Not unwelcome, although I can of course make it or buy it if I wish for it, but on the whole its one I don't like to keep around, and if needed I prefer to anticipate the need for it, get what I need, test on receipt with test paper, and once verified, if any presence of peroxide is present, its destroyed if low levels are present using sodium borohydride, sodium metal etc. (this is not for the non-chem-savvy to undertake using sodium metal to do this as it presents its own set of requirements for safely performing the task)
Kleinerkeffer-with the motivation and reasoning behind my 'reopening' of a mod-closed post without asking and waiting for a response in mind, owing to the immediate, clear and present very, very likely danger, and if so to life and limb to both the OP and to those around him/her I felt I must act regardless. I hope, thus knowing this you will see fit not to subject me to infraction or other punishment for going in and imparting the information regarding the OP's immediate safety and that of their family without waiting. That horror in the pictures might not have waited for all I could do or know. It may still, if the OP has not already got his drug stash/es out of the place to avoid jail time due to bad circumstances, if some shithead spots something and snitches etc then, gone to a place of safety whilst calling the fire service in their area to alert them to the presence and nature of the hazard,
)