An odd find of an antique first-aid kit triggered a Hazmat response in Bexley, and three other antique resellers around the country called emergency services after finding the same material, a local couple says.
Kate Sanfilippo, a Bexley resident who sells handmade and vintage items as pickleladyfarm and PickleladyVintage on Etsy, picked up a 1933 Boy Scouts Johnson & Johnson first-aid kit Friday from a local estate sale.
One of the items in the kit was a small packet of gauze meant for treating burns that was once wet with picric acid. Sanfilippo searched picric acid online to make sure the kit wouldn't need any hazardous material labeling when she shipped it to a potential customer. Picric acid, it turns out, can spontaneously combust or explode unless diluted by 30% with water.