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Carbon monoxide poisoning from 3D laser printer may have killed Berkeley couple

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Re: Carbon monoxide poisoning from 3D laser printer may have killed Berkeley couple

#81

Post by semi-extrinsic »

pmoriarty wrote: post #48
semi-extrinsic wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Omega is one company I would trust for this myself; they sell for industrial applications, not homes, and have a good reputation when it comes to sensors. A CO monitor will set you back $235. http://www.omega.com/pptst/AQM-103.html

Is there any way to know that an expensive CO detector like this is worth getting for home use, instead of one costing 10x less?

Hard to say, but Omega definitely care enough about their brand and reputation to have a good QA system and testing of products in place. Since testing that a CO monitor is working is very hard for a consumer, you rely a lot on trust in the brand.

If you can get a good, trusted brand for home CO monitors, I'd say go for it.

Apparently, Kidde is a trusted brand in fire alarms etc. in the US, so I think this one ($20) is probably equally trustworthy:

https://www.amazon.com/Kidde-Battery-Operated-Carbon-Monoxid...

Re: Carbon monoxide poisoning from 3D laser printer may have killed Berkeley couple

#82

Post by JshWright »

rudedogg wrote: post #40
stcredzero wrote: post #18

CO poisoning is cumulative. It takes a long time for CO to get unstuck from hemoglobin. (About 2 weeks, IIRC.) It could have snuck up on them slowly, then one evening with the cats "napping" they felt particularly tired and thought to themselves, "We must be in hibernation mode from the chilly weather," then they went to sleep then never woke up. CO is odorless. You might get a headache, or you might only feel tired.…

Thanks for saying that, I had no idea CO stays in the body so long. I thought you could just breath fresh air and clear it form your system quickly.

You're correct. Breathing "fresh" air will drop the CO levels in your blood by half every few hours.

Re: Carbon monoxide poisoning from 3D laser printer may have killed Berkeley couple

#83

Post by JshWright »

dghughes wrote: post #37
stcredzero wrote: post #18

CO poisoning is cumulative. It takes a long time for CO to get unstuck from hemoglobin. (About 2 weeks, IIRC.) It could have snuck up on them slowly, then one evening with the cats "napping" they felt particularly tired and thought to themselves, "We must be in hibernation mode from the chilly weather," then they went to sleep then never woke up. CO is odorless. You might get a headache, or you might only feel tired.…

I have a fascination with CO poisoning for some reason or at least the chemistry behind it. CO has more than 200 times the affinity for hemoglobin than oxygen does. You can't just go outside to get fresh air since the CO just won't let go. I believe the normal way it works is oxygen and carbon dioxide use different sections of hemoglobin molecule so they never interfere with the way each are transported. But CO hogs…

> You can't just go outside to get fresh air since the CO just won't let go.

Yes you can...

http://www.remsaeducation.com/news/carbon-monoxide-poisoning...

Re: Carbon monoxide poisoning from 3D laser printer may have killed Berkeley couple

#84

Post by danshapiro »

Animats wrote: post #44

"3D laser printer" probably means a Glowforge. Nobody else calls them that. Their documentation says "Lasers normally require some ventilation via a small tube out a nearby window. Our optional Air Filter that sits under Glowforge and ventilates using HEPA filters and charcoal, meaning no outside ventilation is required." That won't do much if you cut something that emits carbon monoxide when heated. That includes so…

I'm the CEO and cofounder of Glowforge - we're so saddened by this tragedy. Our product was not involved, but that doesn't make us feel any better about this loss.

If you use a laser, ours or anyone else's, please go back right now and re-read the safety instructions. Accidents like this should never happen. My heart breaks for those affected by this.

Re: Carbon monoxide poisoning from 3D laser printer may have killed Berkeley couple

#85

Post by saycheese »

Roger and Val’s friends are trying to raise money to offset the family’s costs for traveling to the funeral and making funeral arrangements. Contributions can be made online:

https://www.gofundme.com/help-roger-hanna-morashs-family

Re: Carbon monoxide poisoning from 3D laser printer may have killed Berkeley couple

#86

Post by dragonwriter »

sulam wrote: post #53
anigbrowl wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm guessing this is undergoing a hurried rewrite, to add something along the lines of 'or you may die.' they're gonna get sued out the yin-yang for this even if the dead couple totally ignored the instructions, on the grounds that the instructions didn't state the danger clearly enough. Having said that, while good safety information is important, two MIT-trained engineers should really have known better.

Why should they have known better? He was a software engineer and she may have had exposure to lab technique but a Glowforge doesn't scream "needs an industrial hood" or anything. Yes, they clearly _could_ have known better, but 'should' seems to be making too-strong assumptions about their class work, MIT or other. They could have had economics degrees for all we know (less likely given their careers, but you get my…

Yeah, while I get that the general public misses this, I'm surprised to see people who apparently think that "engineer" means a Star Trek-style omnicompetent generalist.

Re: Carbon monoxide poisoning from 3D laser printer may have killed Berkeley couple

#87

Post by elihu »

jamiesonbecker wrote: post #58

Article and headline are incorrect: "Carbon monoxide poisoning has also been ruled out."[1][2][3] Both MIT grads; one a founder of gaming company Glug Glug[2] and co-author of game Shard[4] 1. http://www.eastbaytimes.com/2017/01/25/berkeley-toxicology-t... 2. http://kotaku.com/game-developers-mourn-sudden-passing-of-ex... 3. http://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/Two-people-found-dead-Be... 4. http://shard-game.com/

> White also responded to media inquiries about a neighbor’s report of the sound of a generator and an odor of burning rubber coming from the couple’s fourplex in the 3000 block of Deakin Street.

Sounds like they were likely running a laser cutter and the "generator" sound was actually an air compressor. (These are used to blow the smoke out of the way of the beam so that you get a cleaner, more accurate cut.)

Chlorine gas is a major risk with a lot of materials, but presumably there could by other kinds of nasty fumes depending on what they were cutting.

edit: others are saying that it was in fact CO, so I'll go with that. I'd still like to know what they were cutting, though.

Re: Carbon monoxide poisoning from 3D laser printer may have killed Berkeley couple

#88

Post by [deleted] »

pmoriarty wrote: post #48
semi-extrinsic wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Omega is one company I would trust for this myself; they sell for industrial applications, not homes, and have a good reputation when it comes to sensors. A CO monitor will set you back $235. http://www.omega.com/pptst/AQM-103.html

Is there any way to know that an expensive CO detector like this is worth getting for home use, instead of one costing 10x less?

[deleted]

Re: Carbon monoxide poisoning from 3D laser printer may have killed Berkeley couple

#89

Post by pluma »

JshWright wrote: post #83
dghughes wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a fascination with CO poisoning for some reason or at least the chemistry behind it. CO has more than 200 times the affinity for hemoglobin than oxygen does. You can't just go outside to get fresh air since the CO just won't let go. I believe the normal way it works is oxygen and carbon dioxide use different sections of hemoglobin molecule so they never interfere with the way each are transported. But CO hogs…

> You can't just go outside to get fresh air since the CO just won't let go. Yes you can... http://www.remsaeducation.com/news/carbon-monoxide-poisoning...

Emphasis on "just". Yes, obviously getting fresh air is an important step when you suffer from CO poisoning but it's not sufficient. Even the site you linked to mentions you should get additional treatment.

Intuitively most people would think that just stopping to breathe CO is sufficient and breathing fresh air would displace it as quickly as with other common gasses (i.e. you may cough for a bit but recover in minutes) but the point is that CO is clingy.

EDIT: Elsewhere you agree with the assessment that the half-life under "fresh air" is somewhere around 4 hours, so I think you would agree that "just breathe fresh air for a bit" (implying minutes, maybe an hour) isn't a satisfactory treatment in serious cases.

Re: Carbon monoxide poisoning from 3D laser printer may have killed Berkeley couple

#90

Post by rosser »

It's a tangent — and I'll take the downvotes if people want to ding me for asking, given the context — but since you're here: can you please help me understand why your product is useless without the cloud? I'd have gleefully bought one, except for that. And with that, I'm not touching it.
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