Science: Tetraethyl Lead

The Standard Oil Co. of New Jersey has a plant at Bayway, N. J. There last week a man suddenly became raving mad. He was taken to a hospital in Manhattan where he soon died. Others became affected. Within a few days, five men, all raving mad and confined in straight-jackets, died. In all there were 45 men—three shifts of 15 each—working together on the same job. All were placed under medical observation and care. Only ten of them were unaffected. The others all showed symptoms of the disease: headaches, nervousness, insomnia, lowered blood pressure. Such was the toll of the first major onslaught of the newest “occupational disease.” For some time experiments have been going forward in an effort to improve gasoline as an automobile fuel. A motor entirely of glass was constructed to study the explosions in gas engines. It was observed that there was not one explosion in a cylinder but two, in close succession. Various lead compounds were mixed with gasoline and tested to improve the operation. It was found that if 1 part of tetraethyl lead were added to 1,000 parts of gasoline, the effect was to retard the explosions— providing one slower detonation instead of two more rapid ones. This improvement prevents “knocking” in ordinary engines and, to a large degree, the deposit of carbon in cylinders. It laid open the possibility of building a new and more efficient type of engine to use the new mixture—a type of engine which, using ordinary gasoline, would soon pound itself to pieces. But lead is a poisonous substance. Tetraethyl lead must be handled with circumspection in production and distribution. The “Ethyl Gasoline,” gasoline treated with tetraethyl lead, is far less dangerous, containing only “about 1 part in 1,000” of the tetraethyl lead. There are three possible sources of danger in handling the tetraethyl lead and “Ethyl Gasoline”: 1) The hazard in the manufacturing and handling of the concentrated tetraethyl lead. This hazard occurs in the manufacturing plant. 2) The possible hazard in handling the Ethyl Gasoline (1 part of tetraethyl lead to 1,000 parts of gasoline). This possible hazard may affect those handling Ethyl Gasoline. 3) The possible hazard due to the exhaust gases from automobiles using Ethyl Gasoline. This possible hazard concerns the entire public. But the men who died last week were not in contact with the explosion gases of the Ethyl Gasoline, nor with the gasoline itself, but with the 1,000 times more concentrated tetraethyl lead. They had been transferring it into containers to be sent to gasoline stations where it is diluted with the oil. They probably breathed the fumes of the poisonous stuff. Apparently the effect of taking the poison in this way is cumulative and not felt until a considerable dose, possibly a fatal dose, has been received. They may have become careless, and, having no immediate unpleasant effects, continued their carelessness until they were fatally seized. A remedy for the poisoning, if it is not in too advanced a stage, is believed to be the use of intravenous injections of hyposulphite of soda, to dissolve the lead out of the tissues of the body. Under this treatment the other men affected appear to be recovering. The Standard Oil Co. temporarily closed its plant at Bayway. Meanwhile, thoroughly frightened, health authorities in parts of New Jersey and New York forbade the sale of Ethyl Gasoline, and in some other places sale was voluntarily stopped until it could be publicly demonstrated that Ethyl Gasoline is itself harmless.