Mercury leak sparked emergency response at sorting office

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A mercury leak at Slough 's postal sorting-office sparked an emergency response involving six fire crews, a chemical incident unit, Environmental Health and the Health Protection Agency.

Firefighters from Slough, Langley , Windsor and Maidenhead were called to Royal Mail in Sutton Lane at 9.40am yesterday after a small amount of the toxic liquid leaked out of a package.

The liquid metal, which is used in thermometers among other things, can be lethal if absorbed through the skin.

The building was evacuated while firefighters, wearing protective suits, secured the area.

They finally left the scene at 4.30pm and handed responsibility back to Royal Mail

Nicole Targett a spokesman for Royal Berkshire Fire and Rescue, said: "We have to be very careful with substances like mercury. If it had leaked into the water supply it could have potentially affected a very large area."

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A mercury leak at Slough 's postal sorting-office sparked an emergency response involving six fire crews, a chemical incident unit, Environmental Health and the Health Protection Agency.

Firefighters from Slough, Langley , Windsor and Maidenhead were called to Royal Mail in Sutton Lane at 9.40am yesterday after a small amount of the toxic liquid leaked out of a package.

The liquid metal, which is used in thermometers among other things, can be lethal if absorbed through the skin.

The building was evacuated while firefighters, wearing protective suits, secured the area.

They finally left the scene at 4.30pm and handed responsibility back to Royal Mail

Nicole Targett a spokesman for Royal Berkshire Fire and Rescue, said: "We have to be very careful with substances like mercury. If it had leaked into the water supply it could have potentially affected a very large area."

Health and Safety gone mad.
When I were a lad at secondery school we played about with liquid mercury in the Chemistry lessons, handling it with no protective clothing, and it never did me any harm.