# Feasibility of body disposal with acid and plastic barrel a la 'Breaking Bad': NEED ANSWER FAST! **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 2, 2012, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469 "2012-10-02T13:20:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Noel\_Prosequi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b19c9b/32.png) [@Noel\_Prosequi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Noel_Prosequi)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/41 "2012-10-03T14:18:32Z")
> [@madrabbitwoman](#): > > I was going to use this as an example but I can’t find the actual acid used > [Snowtown murders - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snowtown_murders) I was going to cite this too. Don’t read it unless you have a very strong stomach (something about sparklers in the urethra just says wrong! to me). But at the bottom of the Wiki page, it becomes clear that they used HCl, and it seems only to have mummified the bodies. ---
**Author:** ![Tristan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tristan/32/18058_2.png) [@Tristan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tristan)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/42 "2012-10-03T14:27:18Z")
> [@LawMonkey](#): > > With all apologies for the ClF3 hijack, here’s [a little more](http://pipeline.corante.com/archives/2008/02/26/sand_wont_save_you_this_time.php) from the rather enjoyable subsection, “[Things I Won’t Work With](http://pipeline.corante.com/archives/things_i_wont_work_with/)”, of an organic chemist’s blog: I am not a chemist, and in fact stopped taking bio-sciences at Biology in High school. But this blog is fun. Holy Crap. My favorite so far: > [@](#): > > Yes, this is an example of something that becomes less explosive as a one-to-one cocrystal with TNT. Although, as the authors point out, if you heat those crystals up the two components separate out, and you’re left with crystals of pure CL-20 soaking in liquid TNT, a situation that will heighten your awareness of the fleeting nature of life. Just awesome. Concentrated. ---
**Author:** ![Francis\_Vaughan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/francis_vaughan/32/3093_2.png) [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/43 "2012-10-03T14:44:37Z")
> [@Noel\_Prosequi](#): > > I was going to cite this too. Don’t read it unless you have a very strong stomach (something about sparklers in the urethra just says wrong! to me). > > But at the bottom of the Wiki page, it becomes clear that they used HCl, and it seems only to have mummified the bodies. Yeah, you really don’t want to read the middle bit. This is close to home territory for me, I have driven through Snowtown. You can imagine that it was pretty big news. Using Hydrochloric Acid is the easy one for the murderers to pick, you can buy it at any hardware or pool supply shop in 5 litre containers, and it is pretty cheap. That it doesn’t work is a minor issue. Hydrofluoric acid would work even less well, so this is probably the nearest to a real life counterexample to the OP’s scenario. ---
**Author:** ![fiddlesticks](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddlesticks/32/18129_2.png) [@fiddlesticks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fiddlesticks)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/44 "2012-10-03T14:52:36Z")
Lots of stories about Mexican cartels disposing of bodies that way, but most stories don’t mention exactly which acid is favored. Maybe we’ll have to wait for an “Ask the Mexican Cartel Body Disposer” thread. ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/45 "2012-10-03T15:47:14Z")
I don’t get the wold body disposal thing. Anybody with access to a large boiler or incinerator can handle a body disposal job. In a local town (Dedham, MA) a drug dealer killed his supplier (he owed him $30,000). He called his friend (who owned a cement plant)-they burned the body in the cement kiln-no trace of it was ever found. ---
**Author:** ![JacobSwan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a6a055/32.png) [@JacobSwan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JacobSwan)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/46 "2012-10-03T16:10:57Z")
> [@Gyrate](#): > > I don’t know about DNA but acid bath disposal is not a foolproof method of body disposal, as [this guy](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_George_Haigh) found out. He’s related to my wife. I do worry sometimes. ---
**Author:** ![Gray\_Ghost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c0e974/32.png) [@Gray\_Ghost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gray_Ghost)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/47 "2012-10-03T16:21:38Z")
> [@fiddlesticks](#): > > Lots of stories about Mexican cartels disposing of bodies that way, but most stories don’t mention exactly which acid is favored. Maybe we’ll have to wait for an “Ask the Mexican Cartel Body Disposer” thread. The wiki to alkaline hydrolysis, cited above by **CalMeacham** , has cites within it to Mexican mobsters using that technique to make “posole.” How droll. I believe the LA Times article mentioned he used heated NaOH. I’ve seen parties where large tureens of stew were heated with portable propane burners. Something similar would probably work to heat the NaOH/corpse mixture. The outgassing would probably be memorable though; stand upwind. FWIW, HF is used at [commercial car washes](http://www.wthr.com/story/8359144/the-cost-of-clean?clienttype=printable) for [wheel cleaning](http://www.carwash.org/operatorinformation/SafetyResources/Pages/PositionontheUseofHydroflouricAcidIntheCarWashIndustry.aspx), of all things. Wasn’t a carwash one of the front businesses that Walt was going to own? Strikes me as incredibly hazardous, but what do I know? ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/48 "2012-10-03T16:54:36Z")
> [@Gray\_Ghost](#): > > FWIW, HF is used at [commercial car washes](http://www.wthr.com/story/8359144/the-cost-of-clean?clienttype=printable) for [wheel cleaning](http://www.carwash.org/operatorinformation/SafetyResources/Pages/PositionontheUseofHydroflouricAcidIntheCarWashIndustry.aspx), of all things. Wasn’t a carwash one of the front businesses that Walt was going to own? Strikes me as incredibly hazardous, but what do I know? Ha. I operate a couple car washes and Mike’s is a competitor of ours. They were pretty red-faced about that story. They are also one of the largest regional operators in the country (there are no national car wash chains) with like almost 50 stores. Recently, Mike’s went to all HF free. You see, they weren’t just using it in their wheel cleaner…it was going on the painted surfaces of the cars too. That article you linked to includes some bullshit though. For one, the concentration levels of HF used in the industry is really low compared to other industrial uses like metal cleaning. The example they show of a 50% HF solution eating through a glass beaker in no time is impressive, but the raw HF solutions used in the industry are about 8% HF in the 55 gallon drums…and then they are further diluted with water. Furthermore, that car wash manager is a dumbass. You don’t use HF on a car by hand, ever! Its part of an automated process that’s applied by a CTA (chemical tire applicator) that only engages when a car’s wheel is literally a foot away from it so there’s very little risk to employees in that kind of environment. It sure is hell on my carbon steel conveyor rails, though… ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/49 "2012-10-03T17:09:02Z")
> [@Gray\_Ghost](#): > > The wiki to alkaline hydrolysis, cited above by **CalMeacham** , has cites within it to Mexican mobsters using that technique to make “posole.” How droll. I believe the LA Times article mentioned he used heated NaOH. I’ve seen parties where large tureens of stew were heated with portable propane burners. Something similar would probably work to heat the NaOH/corpse mixture. The outgassing would probably be memorable though; stand upwind. > > FWIW, HF is used at [commercial car washes](http://www.wthr.com/story/8359144/the-cost-of-clean?clienttype=printable) for [wheel cleaning](http://www.carwash.org/operatorinformation/SafetyResources/Pages/PositionontheUseofHydroflouricAcidIntheCarWashIndustry.aspx), of all things. Wasn’t a carwash one of the front businesses that Walt was going to own? Strikes me as incredibly hazardous, but what do I know? That’s insane – as the articles cited. Using something as dangerous as HF for cleaning – and the n not informing your staff – is criminally negligent. As for diluting it, you’d have to significantly dilute it – WAYYYY beyond 8% – to make me feel at all comfortable about it. It doesn’t have to be concentrated to wreak havoc with the body. Even being sure that no one touches it is no guarantee of safety – if that CTA uses an aerosol application (it isn’t clear from the description), then droplets of the stuff would be getting into the air. I don’t need my car cleaned enough to take _that_ kind of risk. ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/50 "2012-10-03T17:29:29Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > That’s insane – as the articles cited. Using something as dangerous as HF for cleaning – and the n not informing your staff – is criminally negligent. > As for diluting it, you’d have to significantly dilute it – WAYYYY beyond 8% – to make me feel at all comfortable about it. It doesn’t have to be concentrated to wreak havoc with the body. Even being sure that no one touches it is no guarantee of safety – if that CTA uses an aerosol application (it isn’t clear from the description), then droplets of the stuff would be getting into the air. > > I don’t need my car cleaned enough to take _that_ kind of risk. Its diluted by slightly more than half. Its about 3% coming out of the CTA. I am not trying to say its safe to drink or anything, or that it isn’t hazardous, but it can be used in such an application pretty safely. As you mention, employee training is paramount, but as I mentioned, it would be well nigh impossible for an employee to get in the path of the chemical as the CTA is positioned on the tunnel floor and aims perpendicular to the wheel, and it’s only about a foot away from it. And it’s only actuated by computer control, and only sprays onto the wheel. The timing is very precise. I don’t allow my employees to handle the HF under any circumstances, and when I have to transfer the last little bit out of one barrel into another with a plastic siphon pump, I wear rubber gloves, eye protection and an aspirator as the fumes are noxious. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/51 "2012-10-03T17:39:07Z")
I’m glad to hear you take proper precautions (especially the aspirator), but I’m still nervous around the stuff, myself. All I have to do is think about my friend’s fingers, and then I think “Maybe I’ll just use the wire brush.” ---
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/52 "2012-10-03T17:39:10Z")
> [@Szlater](#): > > The thing that was never clear to me, although having never studied or taught highschool chemistry in the US I may well be utterly wrong, is why does Walt’s highschool chemistry lab have gallons of hydrofluoric acid? > > I mean, in my late '80s, early '90s highschool chemistry lab we had one tiny bottle of the stuff, along with the other tiny bottles of high concentration nitric, sulphuric and hydrochloric acids all stored in a fume cupboard (there were lots of big bottles of various dilutions of those acids, except hydrofluoric). There were probably slightly larger bottles in the fume cupboard in the chemistry prep room to make up the dilutions, but that was it…it’s not like there’s an awful lot of call for hydrofluoric acid in GCSE and A-Level chemistry. Maybe they had a bargain of the stuff at Chemco? Yeh, unless he had time to make an order for jugs of the stuff within a day, or he had concocted one HELL of a classroom chemistry lesson, that’s just a part I’ll suspend some mild disbelief on for the sake of one of the best seasons of television ever. ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/53 "2012-10-03T17:45:55Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > I’m glad to hear you take proper precautions (especially the aspirator), but I’m still nervous around the stuff, myself. All I have to do is think about my friend’s fingers, and then I think “Maybe I’ll just use the wire brush.” Another distinction is the type of car wash we (and Mike’s) are versus the flex-serve wash mentioned in the article with the dumbass manager not knowing what’s going on around him. In a full or flex-serve operation, your employees actually touch the cars inside and out. Here we don’t touch the cars at all, except with water and soap and soft cloth. We are very much like an assembly line operation, we are set up to do 200 cars an hour during our busiest time of the year (winter, snow, salt, etc). As such, everything is automated and computer controlled. The employees on busier days don’t even go into the tunnel…they are outside selling washes, prepping cars with the pressure washer or helping tidy up the lot. My job is to oversee smooth operation and handle crises as they arise. ---
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/54 "2012-10-03T17:46:14Z")
“Today, class, we’re going to learn about molecular discorporation… with a human body…” ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2012, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469/55 "2012-10-03T17:52:01Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > I don’t get the wold body disposal thing. Anybody with access to a large boiler or incinerator can handle a body disposal job. In a local town (Dedham, MA) a drug dealer killed his supplier (he owed him $30,000). He called his friend (who owned a cement plant)-they burned the body in the cement kiln-no trace of it was ever found. I’m sure there’s a lot of people who do not have access to either a large boiler or an incinerator. Me, for example. And I know nobody who does, that I’m aware of. Certainly nobody I’m good enough friends with that I’d ask to help me dispose of a body. Now, I do live in a South Florida east coast city, and do have a pretty good friend with a boat, so a Dexter Morgan style disposal at sea is a little more likely. But even then, I don’t know the real-life effectiveness of that method, like how far out you have to go to not worry about a body or parts washing up on shore. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/feasibility-of-body-disposal-with-acid-and-plastic-barrel-a-la-breaking-bad-need-answer-fast/636469.md?page=2)