Recently, the Ultimate Omelet House had to call repairmen since its air conditioning wasn't functioning correctly. The owner, Dan Byrd, was shocked to find out that the A/C unit had been tampered with to release the refrigerant inside. "Huffing refrigerant was never something that, and I used to be a Daytona Beach cop, you just never heard of that sort of thing," he said.
Replacing the refrigerant will cost over $400.
Tom McGuire, of Flair Air Conditioning, explained that "in the heating and air industry, it's a well-known problem" and that they had problems with refrigerant theft a few years ago.
McGuire also explained the dangers of refrigerant:
"It's going right into their head and they're getting a high that way. If they should happen to sniff the refrigerant liquid, it could kill them by vaporizing their lungs."
In addition, refrigerant "is also under pressure and can explode if you break into pipes, as was done at the restaurant, causing freezer burns and instant frostbite if it makes contact with skin."
Refrigerant theft was the subject of a letter to the editor a few weeks ago.
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