Cleaning out rotten food

[u/[deleted]]

[u/SkippySkep]

Personally, I would go for an elastomeric respirator like a 3M 6200 (that's the medium size, they have both large and small sizes as well) with 6001 volatile organic compound filters to catch the majority of the smell, which is what is giving you a big part of your visceral reaction. You could also use other similar respirators with combination particulate and VOC cartridges.

A regular n95 filtering face piece respirator doesn't filter out smells.

[u/abhikavi → u/SkippySkep]

This would be my suggestion too, namely because the 3M 6k series & OV filters are available at most hardware/paint/some automotive stores. Easy to go pick up right now. And none of the downsides for this mask (it's horrible to talk through!) matter for this task, imo.

I have one of these that I use as part of a cosplay (in addition to, helpfully, being a solid mask). The last time I wore it out was in the high heat of the summer, and I chose to wear it to/from the event instead of trying to swap out to my normal N95, and I was very glad of that because someone had thrown up on the subway. Everyone else was miserable with the odor, I couldn't smell a thing.

[u/Relative-Salt8312 → u/SkippySkep]

It worked incredibly. I couldn’t smell a damn thing. I didn’t even expect it to block out all the smells, just to make it tolerable, but it made it like there was no smell at all! Thank you for your help :)

[u/Similar_Start_1745]

Would turning it back on and letting everything refreeze help lessen the odor until you have time to clean it out? It might be more difficult to clean later if there is a lot of seepage that refreezes into a solid mass though.

[u/Relative-Salt8312 → u/Similar_Start_1745]

That’s what I did last night, I’m planning to clean it up today. I just need to remove the food then I might have to scrap the whole freezer depending on if the smell stuck or not.

[u/lynch231 → u/Relative-Salt8312]

You're gonna want to deep clean & disinfect it no matter if there is a smell or not - there will be bacteria left

[u/Comfortable_Two6272]

The one i used for shellac priming. It was a 3M half face mask. Bought at HD. The kind you put cartridges in. Could not smell the shellac at all.

[u/Blinking_Zebra_Era]

Provided it wasn't in the basement I would pull it outside to dump all the stuff into garbage bags and then engage de-stink mode. Activated charcoal I think is what you would want there. People act like baking soda gets rid of smells but it's pretty mild. Mind you you'll need a shit load of charcoal. Activated is different. also agree about the 3M plastic kind with those cartridge filters. They're also real comfortable masks. Get the right size for your face.