Secret 'gas' test staged at G. Central

BY PETE DONOHUE
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

The Federal Department of Homeland Security released gas in Grand Central Terminal last month in a secret study of how dangerous chemicals might flow through the landmark in a terrorist attack.
Nontoxic "tracer gases" were released into the terminal between June 26-30, as scientists from four national laboratories observed, including physicists from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California.

"If there was some kind of emergency - smoke or who knows what - released in Grand Central Terminal, we want to know how it's going to move around and how best to evacuate it," Metro-North spokeswoman Marjorie Anders said. "Everybody knows that some kind of biological, chemical or radiological threat is something we have to plan for, and this is part of that planning."

[the rest of this article is available at: http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/ ... 8531c.html -ov]

Terminal Proceed wrote:BY PETE DONOHUE
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

The Federal Department of Homeland Security released gas in Grand Central Terminal last month in a secret study of how dangerous chemicals might flow through the landmark in a terrorist attack.
Nontoxic "tracer gases" were released into the terminal between June 26-30, as scientists from four national laboratories observed, including physicists from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California.

"If there was some kind of emergency - smoke or who knows what - released in Grand Central Terminal, we want to know how it's going to move around and how best to evacuate it," Metro-North spokeswoman Marjorie Anders said. "Everybody knows that some kind of biological, chemical or radiological threat is something we have to plan for, and this is part of that planning."

[the rest of this article is available at: http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/ ... 8531c.html -ov]

You could see the air sampling equipment in the north end exits. I think they also shutdown part of the ventilation system durin the test.

There was nothing secret about this test -- there was air monitoring gear (and personnel) all over the place while this was going on, and many people are still "on-site" -- including a crew on the IRT at Grand Central this morning. It's great that DHS is studying these kinds of "attacks", but I think the reporter was wrong for calling it a "secret".

Nester

Wonder what 'tracer gas' they used. And what its half-life is

I saw GCT today in the news, and I saw the mayor of New York making a press conference, now I see this thread was created in coincidence of the London Attacks, I hope we don't get that happening here....

Shutting down the ventilation systems is standard procedure for a range of emergencies. My building shuts down the HVAC automatically with any fire alarm or smoke condition

The gas used was
Sulfur Hexafluoride - SF6
Heres a link to an MSDS
http://www.airgas.com/documents/pdf/1048.pdf

Other than probbably being really on hand*, I wonder why else they used SF6 - I could imagine it'd make for easy detection, but otherwise, I can't see why. It dawned on me that a radioactive tracer gas would probbably a bit too weak once dispersed unless it was really active hehehehe.

*SF6 is used as an insulating gas in electric stuff, I'd imagine MN's ET dept has some on hand, as they probbably use it somewhere. Naturally, despite being perfectly suited for the application (or perhaps because of?), the envirowackos want it banned...

SF6 is pretty much the "industry standard" when it comes to tracer gases used to model potential behavior of bioagents. While I am sure that MN probably has plenty of it laying around, I am sure they need it for their own purposes (insulating gas, probably).

Nester

Interesting - I didnt' realize it had a use beyond switchgear!