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- Apr 28, 2014
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- 3,590
Back in the late '70s I worked for a company that manufactured the 'zipper' conveyor belt system that was used by the tire makers for handling carbon black.Back in the seventies, I worked as an analytical chemist for Ray O Vac. We used carbon black in zinc carbon batteries. The carbon black was basically lamp soot, particles of microscopic size. We had a fellow by the name of Steve who worked for the International Division but was based out of the Madison, Wisconsin office. Steve did a lot of international travel. On one occasion, he was coming back through customs with a several pound box of carbon black for our lab to evaluate. The customs agent insisted on opening the box to inspect the contents. Steve handed him the box and stepped back several paces. The agent opened the box , fairly covering the room with the fine black powder.
Neat design. We weren't making it anymore but there was a marketing model in the 'showroom' plus we still had all the tooling, which I had to inventory every year...
Anyway, over in 'the' warehouse, (one of those dimly lit, dusty, grimy places where stuff goes that noone knows what to do with) there was a pallet.
On said pallet were four cool fiber barrels. There were cool in that they were 'double' barrels, one inside the other.
I didn't have to inventory that stuff -thankfully, some other smuck had that honor.
On the outside of the barrels they were labeled 'CARBON BLACK' and then a bunch of warnings/instructions on how it was to be handled.
Despite the labels, someone decided one day to have a look-see. What a utter and complete mess that was.