Man cooking urine causes building evacuation

[47of74]

A Massachusetts man (what, you thought Florida?) cooking an unusual substance caused an evacuation of his apartment complex

masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2016/07/chemical_causing_brandywine_ev.html

Quote

Urine, not chemicals, forced the evacuation of a dozen units at the Brandywine apartment complex Wednesday night.

Apartment officials called police about an odor coming from one of the 12 units Wednesday afternoon, Assistant Fire Chief Lindsey Stromgren said in an email.

When firefighters entered the apartment, they saw what appeared to be chemicals being mixed or cooked on the stove. The state Hazardous Materials Response team and bomb squad investigated after clearing the building.

But police said Thursday morning the "chemical" was actually distilled urine the tenant was using for medical reasons.

I imagine this dude is deep in his neighbors dog houses right about now.

 

[Khan]

"Medical reasons." What medical reasons does one have for cooking urine? Was this his urine? Dafuq.

 

[47of74]

"Medical reasons." What medical reasons does one have for cooking urine? Was this his urine? Dafuq.

 

Yeah that was my reaction too. If anyone knows please enlighten me.

[RosyDaisy]

The only place urine should go is the toilet or catheter bags.

[Lillymuffin]

I didn't get any hits on cooking it, but there are an alarming number of pages with information on the "medical" uses for urine, most of them not for the squeamish. (And as a sidebar, if anyone ever subpoenas my google search history, I'm going to have a lot of explaining to do!) 

[Cartmann99]

Do a search for "urine therapy" if you really want more information.  Don't read any of the recipes if you do a search, just don't. 

[THERetroGamerNY]

Geez. I just piss and flush, not get all fancy about it...

[47of74]

6 hours ago, Cartmann99 said:

Do a search for "urine therapy" if you really want more information.  Don't read any of the recipes if you do a search, just don't. 

Spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down,
The medicine go down-wown,
The medicine go down!
Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down,
In a most delightful way!

 

[Black Aliss]

Maybe he was actually cooking it down to make saltpeter (potassium nitrate)? Taking historical reenactment to the next level by making his own black powder?

[Bethella]

Boiling urine was used for some now outdated tests during pregnancy- to test for diabetes (sugar in the urine) and eclampsia (protein in the urine). From the book version of Call the Midwife by Jennifer Worth:

Quote

I went to the work surface to test the urine. The litmus paper turned red, showing normal acidity. The urine was cloudy, and the specific gravity high. I wanted to test for sugar, and lit the gas jet. I half filled a test tube with urine, and added a couple of drops of Fehlings solution, and boiled the contents. No sugar was present. Lastly, I had to test for albumen by refilling the test tube with fresh urine, and boiling the upper half only. It did not turn white or thick, indicating that albumen urea was not present.

 

[church_of_dog]

My take on the article was that he was boiling it in order to distill it, in order to use it in some unidentified medical manner.  I didn't presume he was going to ingest it.  I've heard of putting urine on a jellyfish sting or on burns (not arguing that it's effective, just that it's a thing that some people do and that even more people have heard of) -- and if you WERE going to put urine on a sting or a burn (or whatever other kind of medical or pseudo-medical usage), I suppose it might seem prudent to distill it to make sure that's ALL you were getting.

[Khan]

@47of74, you owe me a fresh cup of tea. Having hot tea spray out ones nose is not at all like using a Neti Pot.