posted 10-25-2000 09:05 PM
possible links:
AP Story from Salt Lake City: http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20001025/us/gas_attacks_1.html Defense Threat Reduction Agency: http://www.dtra.mil/
Snort a lungful of sulfur hexaflouride: http://www.physics.umd.edu/deptinfo/facilities/lecdem/h6-05.htm
Text from yahoo AP:
"Wednesday October 25 5:01 PM ET
Salt Lake Conducts Gas Experiments
By PAUL FOY, Associated Press Writer
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - In what sounds like something out of ``The
X-Files,'' scientists are releasing gas on downtown Salt Lake City in
experiments aimed at preparing for the possibility of a terrorist attack.
By releasing tiny amounts of a safe gas called sulfur hexafluoride, they are
trying to understand the risk of chemical or biological attacks on urban areas.
The gas is released on a street corner from a pressurized cylinder with a fan.
The experiments could be useful for security during the 2002 Olympic Winter
Games in Salt Lake.
Scientists chose Salt Lake because its mountain-rimmed basin is vulnerable to
weather inversions that trap pollutants near the ground. That could make a
chemical attack even more dangerous.
Scientists funded by the Energy Department have been joined here by
members of the Pentagon (news - web sites)'s Defense Threat Reduction
Agency.
Sixty environmental experts from government labs and universities are using
portable weather stations to measure the tracer gas as it blows over and
around the city's tallest buildings.
From its command post, the Defense Threat Reduction Agency measures the
amount of gas that can get into a building through the ventilation system. It
hopes to improve the accuracy of its computer projections on the flow of
deadly gas.
The agency's involvement has some residents worried, and rumors have been
circulating.
``We had people calling up wondering when the airplanes are going to be
dropping chemicals,'' said Chris Kramer, a spokesman for Utah Public Safety.
The ninth and final experiment was planned for Wednesday night and early
Thursday.
-
On the Net:
Department of Energy (news - web sites)'s Vertical Transport and Mixing
Program Web site: http://www.pnl.gov/vtmx
Department of Energy's Chemical and Biological National Security Program:
http://www.nn.doe.gov/cbnp/welcome.shtml