Alert over South Korea toxic leaks

On 27 September 2012, about eight tonnes of highly toxic hydrogen fluoride (HF) gas, which dissolves in the moisture in air to form droplets of corrosive hydrofluoric acid, burst from the Hube Global chemical plant in Gumi. According to the Ministry of Environment, 26 businesses each handled around 10 tonnes of HF in 2001; by 2010, the number of these large-scale handlers had almost tripled, and in 2011, 545 companies were registered as producers or distributors of the gas.