kjlm The Korean Journal of Laboratory Medicine Korean J Leg Med 2383-5702 2383-5710 The Korean Society for Legal Medicine 10.7580/kjlm.2016.40.3.83 kjlm-40-83 Original Article An Unexpected Death Related to Accidental Gasoline Inhalation KimSo-Woon 1 LeeKyounghong 2 LeeYoung-Man 2 ParkJong-Shin 3 ParkJaehong 4 ChoiByung Ha 4 ParkSohyung 4 Department of Pathology, Asan Medical Center, University of Ulsan College of Medicine, Seoul, Korea Department of Forensic Medicine Investigation, National Forensic Service Seoul Institute, Seoul, Korea Forensic Toxicology & Chemistry Division, National Forensic Service Seoul Institute, Seoul, Korea Medical Examiner's Office, National Forensic Service, Wonju, Korea Correspondence to Sohyung Park Medical Examiner's Office, National Forensic Service, 10 Ipchun-ro, Wonju 26460, Korea Tel: +82-2-2600-4614 Fax: +82-2-2600-4828 E-mail: zzeva@korea.kr 122016 19122016 403 8387 31072016 23082016 25082016 Copyright © 2016 The Korean Society for Legal Medicine 2016 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Gasoline is a chemical compound of aliphatic and aromatic hydrocarbons, and it easily vaporizes because of its volatile characteristics. Gasoline inhalation may occur accidentally or intentionally in various situations which could result in acute non-lethal or lethal intoxication. Given that gasoline is widely used in everyday life, it is surprising that deaths related to gasoline inhalation rarely occur. We presented a rare case of unexpected death related to gasoline inhalation with the postmortem findings and features.

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(A) The cover of the upper compartment of the gasoline tank is shown. (B) The gasoline tank comprised two compartments; the upper compartment was like a manhole; cylindrical, approximately 1.5 m in height and 0.7 m in diameter, and the lower compartment as a storage tank for unleaded gasoline, was bigger than the upper one.

The mask which the deceased was wearing is shown. It seems to be a mask to prevent gas or dust, depending on what kind of filter is used.