Brain Teasers
Drink of Death
Gerta's husband left her for another woman, so she decided to make a lethal mixture to take her life. Attempting to make it as powerful as possible, she mixed sodium hydroxide with hydrochloric acid. She quaffed her cocktail of death, but nothing happened. Why?
Answer
Sodium hydroxide is a base and hydrochloric acid is an acid. When she mixed them together, they cancelled each other out. If she had taken either of them separately, she would have died. Together, she was drinking salt water.Hide Answer Show Answer
What Next?
View a Similar Brain Teaser...
If you become a registered user you can vote on this brain teaser, keep track of which ones you have seen, and even make your own.
Solve a Puzzle
Comments
Great thinking! I completely forgot that sodium hydroxide was a base.
Great thinking! I completely forgot that sodium hydroxide was a base.
oops sorry about that
I guess she must have mixed equal volumes of equivalent molarity solutions. Lucky!
Drink enough salt water, and it will kill you.
Got it!
NaOH + HCl --> NaCl + H2O
mmmm, salt water eh....bad for ur blood pressure.....lol
mmmm, salt water eh....bad for ur blood pressure.....lol
NaOH + HCl --> NaCl + H2O
mmmm, salt water eh....bad for ur blood pressure.....lol
mmmm, salt water eh....bad for ur blood pressure.....lol
This is way too easy.
state the obvious,simple chemistry!
Not to be too pickey (even though I still liked it) but they technically didn't cancel each other out in the sense your thinking. The base added acted as a buffer which made the solution neutral. But I still love chemistry problems!
i will drink to that
That Explains that you should be careful when you are doing chemistrty or that situation could happen maybe even a worse one ahh
i think it would have killed her. the taste of salt water alone is fatal!!!!! just joking. well, that was a good one! i liked it and i hope to hear more from you.
Basic chem... ::sigh:: And what if she screwed up and it wasn't an even mixture? She'd have her wish, then. lol
Good thing I took Chemistry next year. Great teaser!
But she'd have to mix it in PERFECT proportion
To post a comment, please create an account and sign in.
Follow Braingle!