From: cash@convex.com (Peter Cash)
Subject: Re: Nature of the Waco gas
Nntp-Posting-Host: zeppelin.convex.com
Organization: The Instrumentality
X-Disclaimer: This message was written by a user at CONVEX Computer
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Lines: 29

In article <1r6170INNdlu@cronkite.Central.Sun.COM> dbernard@clesun.Central.Sun.COM writes:
>Just heard on the network radio news a spokesman from the
>army saying that the type of CS gas used in Waco had been
>banned from military use.  Its use is also banned by a
...
>The reason given was that the use causes extreme nausea,
>blindness, disorientation, total irrationality, raging paranoia.  
>Children would be all the more susceptible, and show the results all the
>earlier.  

If we are indeed talking about CS, then this is not quite accurate. CS is
"just" tear gas--albeit the worst kind. It isn't a nausea gas, and doesn't
have direct CNS effects. However, it's quite bad--much worse than CN gas. I
was briefly exposed to it once (during an engagement in Berkeley circa 1968
8^) and it's not the kind of thing you forget. It seems to be
moisture-activated--it not only made my eyes sting and water, but attacked
my breathing passages and lungs. Breathing was painful, and my entire face
felt as if it was on fire. These effects persisted for hours after
exposure, and I was coughing for days afterwards.  If I was exposed to a
dense concentration of this stuff in a closed space for several hours, I
doubt whether I could find the exit. Indeed, I can't imagine living through
it.


-- 
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             |      Die Welt ist alles, was Zerfall ist.     |
Peter Cash   |       (apologies to Ludwig Wittgenstein)      |cash@convex.com
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