Aquarium Fans: Please help me kill someone (fictionally.)
May 1, 2024 1:54 PM   Subscribe

Hi there! I'm revising my latest novel and I have a problem. I changed my killer from a fisherman to a teacher with aquariums (long story...) and now the murder weapon I have no longer makes sense. Are there any pieces of aquarium equipment that would be heavy enough (and sturdy enough) to use as a blunt force object? The only thing I can think of are the decorative castles and things like that, but I don't know how heavy they actually are. I'm hoping there's something unusual and specific I can use-- if there's not, could you please let me know? I'm already missing that gaff hook...
posted by headspace to Writing & Language (22 answers total) 1 user marked this as a favorite
 
Best answer: Well, most large (lets say 90 gallons plus) aquariums will have large rocks that could very easily stove in a persons head. I own such an aquarium and there are at least 4 rocks in there that would be unpleasnt to get bonked with. The actual mechanical equipment itself, not so much, unless they had a battery back up unit or some such thing. A 90 gallon aquarium is not so large as to be very unusual btw, so plausible a teacher would own one, particularly if they were the type to have multiple aquariums.
posted by jcworth at 2:01 PM on May 1, 2024 [2 favorites]


Best answer: Heck I have a rock in my 20 gallon that could kill someone easy.
posted by wellifyouinsist at 2:04 PM on May 1, 2024 [1 favorite]


Best answer: People with planted, freshwater aquariums typically use big CO2 cannisters. I have three in my house, one 10lb and two 5lb; any of them when full would do as a weapon.
posted by eraserbones at 2:04 PM on May 1, 2024 [1 favorite]


Best answer: It's common to keep Palythoa or Zoanthid coral in a saltwater reef tank, which your villain can use as a source of palytoxin. Just being stung by the coral probably wouldn't be enough, but there are several cases of hobbyists being sickened by either boiling or cutting a rock with zoanthids on it.

https://www.sahealth.sa.gov.au/wps/wcm/connect/public+content/sa+health+internet/healthy+living/protecting+your+health/your+home/palytoxin+poisoning+marine+aquarium+safety
posted by eraserbones at 2:08 PM on May 1, 2024 [3 favorites]


Best answer: Heavy objects in and around my large-ish aquaria: rocks, heavy pieces of bogwood, a couple of canister filters, a couple of big multi-outlet pumps (some of the more expensive ones have a sturdy metal case). Ornaments (of which I have none) tend to be resin, and are pretty hard, if not super-heavy.
posted by pipeski at 2:14 PM on May 1, 2024


Best answer: The LED light strip on my largest tank is chunky enough that you could lift it off the tank and lamp someone with it - it's about the mass of a baseball bat.
posted by pipeski at 2:16 PM on May 1, 2024 [1 favorite]


Best answer: Wood canopy; bag of aquarium gravel
posted by Iris Gambol at 2:38 PM on May 1, 2024 [1 favorite]


Best answer: Many enthusiasts have entire extra tanks around, and it's definitely not because we are hoarders but because we might need to spin up a hospital/quarantine/nursery tank, deal with a leak, be struck with the sudden urge to try out a new aquascape, accidentally went to a garage sale, etc.

An empty 10G weighs about 11lbs and could be swung with one hand by a good-sized adult. A 20G runs about 25lbs and you'd either want both hands to wield it or it could fall/be pushed off a shelf*.

But yeah, I had several large lava rocks in mine, and that's probably going to require the least explanation.

*If you need some kind of machinations to the murder, obviously a nearby lamp or toaster or whatever could fall in during arms-in maintenance like gravel-vacuuming or planting or fiddling with plants/decor.
posted by Lyn Never at 2:49 PM on May 1, 2024 [4 favorites]


Best answer: A piece of coral would be a great weapon, jagged edges, with lots of knobby bits.
posted by jennstra at 2:50 PM on May 1, 2024 [1 favorite]


Best answer: I had a near death experience with a stone-fish Synanceia verrucosa when I worked at Blijdorp Zoo in Rotterdam. I fell from a plank over the service area behind the the tropical fish and narrowly missed plunging my hand into the small enough aquarium holding a pair of stone fish. So "narrowly missed" that I put one hand on the glass and cracked it as I went down doing an acrobatic 360° turn. Murder? Lot of glass in aquariums, can be sharp.

The centre of the big exhibition was a U-shaped 30m aquarium. To stop people gazing at the fish but being distracted by, like, people the other side of the aquarium, it was decided to carve a midline reef out of expanded polystyrene, cover it in cement and paint it. When they filled the tank, the reef detached from the bottom, turned over and floated to the top. So be careful what sort of aquarium rocks you employ for blunt force trauma.

CO2 is promising. When I later worked in a hospital, a colleague had her NDE when she opened the door to the walk in cold-room first thing in the morning, and was assaulted with a wall of CO2. Some noob had wanted to keep for re-use the dry-ice in which their reagents had been packed and left the box in the cold room to slow the sublimation. Overnight the cold room had filled with heavier than air CO2. Luckily my colleague fell backwards, and her nose was just above the wash of CO2 as it flowed off down the stairs.
posted by BobTheScientist at 2:57 PM on May 1, 2024 [8 favorites]


I think BobTheScientist has the funnest idea: you want a poisonous fish or other aquarium-dweller!
posted by Dr. Wu at 3:17 PM on May 1, 2024 [1 favorite]


Best answer: Or. What if, being a fish-inclined person, they've made use of a gaff hook (etc.) for some classroom purpose? Maybe they're short and it's normally for pulling down the projector screen, and it's never really occurred to anyone how alarmingly outsized a tool it is for that purpose.
posted by teremala at 4:05 PM on May 1, 2024 [2 favorites]


Best answer: Are we talking pet-store aquarium or public-attraction aquarium? On the pet store side, aquarium glass usually isn't tempered so if one broke it'd leave some rather nasty sharp glass shards around.
posted by Aleyn at 4:30 PM on May 1, 2024 [1 favorite]


Best answer: Personally I think using aquarium decor as a murder weapon is the way to go. A little castle could be ideal for bludgeoning, plus there's the sharpness of the spire roofs. Or somebody could get clobbered with a figure of Poseidon, and then during the autopsy the examiner finds a tiny piece of the bronze trident broken-off in the wound...
posted by Ursula Hitler at 4:43 PM on May 1, 2024 [4 favorites]


Best answer: Rocks are the obvious choice, but a large filter or similar equipment could do the job. Rocks would be good not only because they're an obvious and credible weapon, but because they can be placed back in the water after the deed, which may or may not remove any evidence.

... a nearby lamp or toaster or whatever could fall in during arms-in maintenance like gravel-vacuuming or planting or fiddling with plants/decor.
Those aquarium heaters that are basically an element inside a test-tube can deliver a nasty shock if you come into contact with the element after removing the glass tube. Ask me how I know ...
posted by dg at 5:37 PM on May 1, 2024 [1 favorite]


Best answer: Aquarium glass? That stuff is pretty heavy.

Failing that, there is always electricity feeding pumps and lights that could lead to a shocking end.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 5:37 PM on May 1, 2024 [1 favorite]


Best answer: Maybe the killer has something in the tank that isn't typical aquarium decor, but is historic or sentimental for them. I'm thinking of, like, a little cast-iron statue of Poseiden or something (I don't keep fish, so don't know how safe iron in the tank would be for them) that belonged to their grandparents when they were a kid.
posted by Well I never at 5:52 PM on May 1, 2024 [1 favorite]


Best answer: Sharp long handled forceps or tweezers used for planting? Curved plant scissors?
posted by MagnificentVacuum at 5:56 PM on May 1, 2024 [1 favorite]


Best answer: Aquaria have lots of plumbing. Large pipe wrenches would be a likelihood.
posted by OHenryPacey at 7:13 PM on May 1, 2024 [1 favorite]


Am I the only one who is looking at all this contained water and envisioning a drowning? Just hold their heads in there, dammit.
posted by Jilder at 7:42 PM on May 1, 2024 [3 favorites]


Response by poster: You guys are genuinely fucking delightful. Thank you so much for the many ways to dispatch my character. I now wish I had straight up written a book about nothing but aquarium-related murders.
posted by headspace at 5:50 PM on May 2, 2024 [1 favorite]


Response by poster: (PS Jilder, alas, I would love to drown somebody (fictionally) in an aquarium. Sadly, I have to clock somebody who has escaped the premises!)
posted by headspace at 5:55 PM on May 2, 2024 [1 favorite]


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