About 15 years ago, my mother gave me a jacket in lovely (ahem) shades of green and blue which has found a use in my trunk as my emergency jacket. It has lived there happily for a long time, and I see it now and then. Sometime in the last month or so, something must have gotten on it to destroy it.
I didn't knowingly put anything in the trunk which would have damaged it, so my main concern is learning what I did wrong, since I put my pack and all my other gear in the same trunk from time to time. I do carry normal household things and basic car repair things, but nothing particularly strange. I don't remember spilling anything.
This fine specimen of a jacket is made of nylon (non ripstop) over essentially a fleece full liner. There seems to be a very small layer of poly fill over the fleece in the sleeves only. It's supposed to be blue, but on all the damaged places it's white. The white doesn't look like it has dripped, so I'm thinking it's probably not bleach. It looks almost like it was sprayed, but there's no obvious scattering. Another thought it maybe something solid laid on top of it?
The damaged parts are very brittle and while still flexible, they have no tensile strength at all. This has caused lots of tears. No, I'm not weeping, I mean it tore. Nothing rubs off on my hand. The fleece doesn't seem to be damaged at all, only the nylon.
Now, the big question is, what could have done this? I will attach some pictures. This was taken with my cellphone, outside under parking lot lights at night, so the color is weird. Any white specs you see are just a dusting of snow.
