methyl isocyanate

noun

: an extremely toxic chemical CH₃NCO used especially in the manufacture of pesticides

—abbreviation MIC

Examples of methyl isocyanate in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Up to 20,000 people prematurely died, including at least 3,800 immediately, after a plume of methyl isocyanate gas leaked from the Union Carbide India Ltd. plant in Bhopal, India, where it was used to make the pesticide Sevin. —Lorenzino Estrada, The Arizona Republic, 3 Dec. 2024

For the first decade, the Bhopal plant imported methyl isocyanate. —Eli Wizevich, Smithsonian Magazine, 3 Dec. 2024

In Bhopal, a methyl isocyanate gas leak at a pesticide plant spread toxic gas for a 7-kilometer radius, exposing more than half a million people in the city of Bhopal to the gas and led to up to 30,000 deaths in the region. —City News Service, San Diego Union-Tribune, 8 June 2023

India suffered the world's worst industrial disaster in 1984 when methyl isocyanate gas leaked from a pesticide factory owned by American Union Carbide Corporation in the city of Bhopal, killing more than 5,000 people. —Reuters, CNN, 7 Jan. 2022

The need for more information from chemical manufacturers and users became a global priority in 1984 when a Union Carbide plant released a burst of methyl isocyanate, an extremely toxic gas that killed at least 3,800 and, by some accounts, as many as 16,000 people in Bhopal, India. —Michael Hawthorne, chicagotribune.com, 17 May 2021

In 1984, India suffered the world's worst industrial disaster when methyl isocyanate gas leaked from a pesticide factory in the city of Bhopal, killing more than 5,000 people and injuring more than half a million others. —Aj Willingham, CNN, 7 Jan. 2022

Shortly after midnight on December 3, 1984, in the central Indian city of Bhopal, a tank in a pesticide factory leaked, releasing methyl isocyanate into the night sky. —Vidya Krishnan, The Atlantic, 27 Apr. 2021

In a major industrial disaster in India in 1984, at least 2,850 people were killed and 20,000 injured when methyl isocyanate gas leaked from a tank at Union Carbide India Ltd.’s Bhopal plant in central India. —NBC News, 7 May 2020

Word History

First Known Use

1889, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for methyl isocyanate

• acetoacetate
• macroinvertebrate
• oxaloacetate
• phosphoenolpyruvate
• abate
• airfreight
• await
• baseplate
• berate
• birthdate
• birthrate
• bookplate

Medical Definition

methyl isocyanate

noun

meth·​yl iso·​cy·​a·​nate

-ˌī-sō-ˈsī-ə-ˌnāt

: an extremely toxic chemical CH₃NCO that is used especially in the manufacture of pesticides and was the cause of numerous deaths and injuries in a leak at a chemical plant in Bhopal, India, in 1984

—abbreviation MIC