Chemical Warfare
The Second Battle of Ypres was the first time Germany used chemical weapons on a large scale on the Western Front in World War I. 168 tons of chlorine gas was released on 22 April over a four mile (6 km) front. Around 6,000 troops died within ten minutes from asphyxiation. The gas affects the lungs and the eyes causing respiration problems and blindness. Being denser than air it flowed downwards forcing the troops to climb out of trenches.
Eventually reserve Canadian troops held the front, being away from the attack, using urine-soaked cloths as primitive respirators. A Canadian soldier realized that the ammonia in urine would react with the chlorine, neutralizing it, and that the water would dissolve the chlorine, allowing the soldiers to breathe through the gas. This is the first recorded response and defense against chemical attacks using respirators.
Read more about this topic: Respirator
Famous quotes containing the words chemical and/or warfare:
“We are close to dead. There are faces and bodies like gorged maggots on the dance floor, on the highway, in the city, in the stadium; they are a host of chemical machines who swallow the product of chemical factories, aspirin, preservatives, stimulant, relaxant, and breathe out their chemical wastes into a polluted air. The sense of a long last night over civilization is back again.”
—Norman Mailer (b. 1923)
“And God would bid His warfare cease,
Saying all things were well;
And softly make a rosy peace,
A peace of Heaven with Hell.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)