A few days ago I unplugged an old hard drive while the comp was still on. I only unplugged the sata cable not the power cable (which I've done many times and it has always been fine) but this time the thing caught on fire.

I almost instantly smelled it and stopped the fire. I removed the hard drive and put it in another room (a bad idea bleh. I didn't realize). Then I left the windows and door of the room it burnt in open to air out. I had a fan blowing on the area that the occurance happened, out the door of the room, and also out the window (and in from the window).

The next day I noticed the smell remained. I then found where the thing burnt/melted and removed every piece I could find with any residual plastic/burnt/smell/melt and took that stuff outside. I've continued to air out the room and leave the door and window open at all times. I also put a small dish of vinegar near the area the hd burnt up and left that there for several days. There is no longer any smell, however, everytime I'm in this room I start to get shortness of breath symptoms. Could I have blown toxic plastic particles all over the room and rendered everything in here deadly? I'm never sure if shortness of breath I get is from just my typical health problems or something else... but it really seems like everytime I;m in here I start getting air hunger.


what to do ??? Will burnt plastic in a room ever just detoxify by itself? Or is it permenantly toxic and in the walls/ceiling/carpet/clothes/pillows/everything now?

Thanks for any info if anyone knows