HAMILTON - A bottle of cyanide found by Hamilton railway tracks held enough poison to kill 1250 people.
Chris Cable and son James were checking their beehives near Tranz Rail marshalling yards in the city two days ago when James saw the bottle in a pile of rubbish.
Mr Cable, a licensed poison user, recognised the bottle immediately.
He said it contained about 250g of cyanide.
"This stuff is instantaneous. A tiny bit on your fingernail would be enough to kill you if you swallowed it."
Gil Elliott, from the National Poisons Centre, said the average lethal dose for a human was 200mg, and therefore the amount found was sufficient to kill 1250 people.
Mr Cable said the yards were a popular thoroughfare for children and for people walking dogs.
"If a child had taken the cap off and had a whiff it would have dropped them on the spot.
"Someone has been extremely negligent. This is not the sort of stuff that should be lying around in the middle of the city."
Police are trying to trace the cyanide's origin.
Just a week ago, a tube of cyanide was found after being lost in bush near Cambridge.
- NZPA
Deadly poison find threat to hundreds
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