Chemical smell to linger after West Virginia water is safe to drink

[jakeXT]

6. They know about its half-life but not so much about its effect on humans.

The chemical has a half-life (meaning half of it will have broken down into other elements in this amount of time) of roughly two weeks in water, a month in soil and, if it gets into the muck at the bottom of the river, 140 days in sediments. Microbes and the slow workings of natural chemistry help with that. Its half-life is less than a day in air, quickly broken down by sunlight.

Nonetheless, as Halden says "exposure should be avoided because the health effects are a bit uncertain. You should never be exposed to an industrial chemical unless there's a good reason."

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=how-dangerous-is-the-chemical-spilled-in-west-virginia&page=2