how to deal with lye spillages

[PedroSanchez]

i am new to DMT extraction and currently in the process of my first attempt.
during my research i have read over and over again to have vinegar on stand-by to neutralise any lye spills. makes sense! so i did.
i spilled a very small amount of the lye and water mix (couple of drops) and because i do not yet fully understand the power of lye i decided to use extra vinegar just in case, so i used what i thought was a very excessive amount, then afterwards decided to have a search to see how much is really necessary.

my search took me to some pages that said not to neutralise with vinegar (or at all?) because it can cause an exothermic reaction, making it more dangerous, instead you should use water and neutralise the small remaining amounts afterwards.
it wasnt very clear exactly what the details were and they did not offer solutions, only raised problems.

i was wondering if you guys could help clear this up for me? what is the best thing to do?
when it is dry it is simple, you can just sweep it up, but what should we do if we spill wet lye? be it small or large amounts.

thanks for the help!

 

[Tony6Strings]

This is a great question. I was doing heated pulls last week, and the rubber stopper popped out of my Erlenmeyer as I had it in my hands turned 90° in the process of rolling it. Basic soup was shot out of the flask into my kitchen, living room, walls, floor, some got on me, some got on my fiance.

If you've spilled lye on your skin, IMMEDIATELY wash the area with vinegar. The lye will continue to eat your skin until neutralized. After vinegar, water, of course.

What I do for the mess on the floor, walls, appliances, house etc... Wearing gloves, mop it up with a towel wet with vinegar. Then water, after you've cleaned the bulk of the mess.

These are just my diy kitchen chem methods I have developed out of necessity. I would love to hear from some of our more learned and experienced chemists. What is the best practice method for cleaning up a NaOH spill?

 

[PedroSanchez]

thanks for the reply.
i will keep to the mindset i currently have for now then. i feel like they might have been referring to large amounts. i would also love to hear from the guru chemists.

so far my experience is that a small splash cleaned with vinegar is not likely to create any nasty surprises. i feel like if it was a problem, at least for bark extraction quantities, then it would be more widely known by now.

thanks for the reply