What is this thing?

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Found on a beach south of England (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 3 days ago by Soulstorm@sh.itjust.works to c/whatisthisthing@lemmy.world

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Thought it might be a battery pack at first so I wasn’t going to touch it but it appears to be plastic.

Possibly broken at the top? Unsure.

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[–] Tar_alcaran@sh.itjust.works 19 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (2 children)

I think these have basically always been carbon-zinc, or alkaline.

Technically, zinc is a heavy metal, but basically harmless to humans unless you eat the whole thing. Alkaline batteries contain managous oxide, which is a heavy metal, but you'd need some serious chronic exposure to get into trouble from that.

It's still a good idea not to open random crap that washes ashore, because there are definitely FAR more dangerous things that come in small metal cylinders. Like unexploded ordnance.

[–] threelonmusketeers@sh.itjust.works 1 points 7 hours ago

managous

Manganese :)

[–] essell@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago

Technically, zinc is a heavy metal, but basically harmless to humans unless you eat the whole thing.

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