Key Points

Fire

• Highly flammable
• Reacts with reacts with strong oxidants causing fire and explosion hazards
• Emits toxic fumes of hydrogen cyanide and nitrogen oxides when heated to decomposition
• In the event of a fire involving acetonitrile, use alcohol resistant foam, or fine water spray if not available, and normal fire kit with breathing apparatus

Health

• Toxic via ingestion, inhalation or dermal contact
• CHIP: highly flammable, harmful and irritant
• Early features include headache, nausea, dizziness and anxiety followed by confusion, drowsiness, tachycardia, palpitations and tachypnoea 
• In cases of moderate toxicity there may be brief episodes of loss of consciousness, convulsions, vomiting, profound lactic acidosis and hypotension 
• In severe poisoning deep coma, fixed unreactive pupils, cardiovascular collapse, respiratory depression, myocardial ischaemia, cardiac arrhythmias and pulmonary oedema may develop

Environment

• Avoid release into the environment
• Inform Environment Agency of substantial release incidents

 

All sections are available to download in PDF format.

• Incident Management (PDF, 134 KB)
  Acetonitrile - Incident Management
  Added/updated: 24 May 2011