what are the effects of long-term exposure to mustard gas? quizlet
"Here are some little-known facts near one of history's about terrible weapons of mass devastation."
TO THE MILLIONS OF MEN FIGHTING IN FLANDERS in 1917, it would accept been hard to imagine how the hell of trench warfare could exist made any worse. But worse information technology would become that yr, cheers to the introduction of a new and particularly horrifying chemic weapon.
On July 12, German language gunners lobbed more than than 50,000 artillery shells containing an experimental poison gas into the British and Canadian lines nearly Ypres. Unlike the widely used chlorine or phosgene agents, which attacked the eyes and lungs, this new terror burned its victims bodies both within and out. And considering of the unmistakable pungent aroma that accompanied its release, soldiers in the trenches soon had a name for the weapon: mustard gas.
Initially, those in the path of the unfamiliar and faintly yellow vapour had piffling idea they were fifty-fifty in danger. Simply within hours, the gas' lethal furnishings would be all besides obvious. Shortly after its kickoff use, dressing stations up and downward front end were flood with more than than 2,000 victims suffering from excruciating and untreatable blisters on their arms, legs and torsos. Most were blinded; others were slowly suffocating. Nearly 100 of the casualties succumbed to their wounds within a few days. Over the side by side several weeks, one million mustard gas shells would land on the Centrolineal lines near Ypres leaving thousands writhing in desperation, disfigured and unfit for duty. More than than 500 deaths would be recorded. [1]
By the autumn, mustard gas was in use all along the Western Front end. Information technology would go along to exist released right upwards until the Armistice, eventually condign one of the virtually powerful symbols of the nightmare of trench warfare. Here are some little-known facts about this terrible weapon of mass destruction.
• Sulphur Mustard or mustard gas was originally called "LOST" in reference to the last names of the German chemists that first engineered it — Wilhelm Lo mmel and Wilhelm St einkopf. [2] It was besides code named "Yperite" afterwards the Belgian town where information technology was first used, "Yellowish Cross," "Mustard T" or simply "H."
• The gas is classified every bit a "cyotoxic" amanuensis, pregnant that it attacks all living cells information technology comes into contact with. Made of sulphur dichloride and ethylene, the thick, oily, brownish liquid gives off a weak garlic, horseradish or mustard odour when exposed to air.
• Although introduced to the battleground in 1917, the nasty effects of sulphur mustard were known equally far back as the 1860s. A German chemist named Albert Niemann (the same private who discovered cocaine in 1859), was among the first to document the poisonous substance'due south characteristics. In 1913, British and German civilian researchers studying sulphur mustard were accidentally exposed during lab work and had to be hospitalized. The High german military obtained the notes about the incident and promptly explored weaponizing a version of information technology. [3]
• Germany eventually developed an assortment of delivery systems for mustard gas, including arms shells, mortar rounds, rockets, costless autumn bombs and fifty-fifty land mines. According to one estimate, the British army alone suffered 20,000 mustard gas casualties in just the last yr of the state of war.
• According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, the beginning sign of mustard gas poisoning is a balmy peel irritation that appears several hours afterwards exposure. Afflicted areas gradually turn yellow and somewhen agonizing blisters class on the pare. Eyes become red, sore and runny — extreme hurting and blindness follows. Other symptoms include nasal congestion, sinus pain, hoarseness, coughing and in extreme cases respiratory failure. Sustained exposure can produce nausea, diarrhea and abdominal hurting. Fatalities typically occur inside a few days, merely information technology can take weeks, even months for survivors to fully recover. And some never do; permanent blindness, scars, long-term respiratory damage and heightened risk of cancer are just some of the long-term effects of mustard gas poisoning. To this 24-hour interval, there is no antidote for mustard gas. The CDC reports that treatment options are limited to "supportive care."
• Amazingly, mustard gas wasn't the deadliest agent to be used in the First Earth War. Only between 1 and v pct of those exposed to it died every bit a upshot. [4] Nevertheless, it terrified soldiers because dissimilar other chemical weapons, victims were often unaware they were being poisoned. What's more than, gas masks and respirators only protected the lungs from the toxin; everything else burned, fifty-fifty skin below wearable. One time discharged on the battlefield, sulphur mustard could have days to misemploy. Since it was heavier than air, vapours would settle into shell-holes, craters and trenches and taint the h2o that nerveless in No Human being's Land. Co-ordinate to veterans, men ofttimes tracked contaminated mud dorsum into their dugouts before turning in and unknowingly poisoned themselves and their comrades while they slept.
• Despite the outrage that followed Germany's utilise of mustard gas in 1917, the Allies immediately engineered their own stockpiles of the stuff. By November, the British were dropping sulphur mustard onto German trenches at Cambrai. In fact, the breakout through the Hindenburg Line in 1918 was aided by a massive Allied mustard gas attack. America's Dow Chemical manufactured the poison during the last year of the war. [5]
• Although the apply of mustard gas was universally condemned subsequently the state of war and later banned past the Geneva Protocol of 1925, armies the world over continued to use it long after 1918. British forces participating in the intervention in Russia used sulfur mustard shells confronting the Bolsheviks. Both the Spanish and French air corps dropped the agent from planes onto Rif insurgents in Morocco during the 1920s. Italians used mustard gas against Abyssinian guerrillas while the Japanese gassed Chinese armies and civilians alike in Manchuria during the 1930s.
• During World War Two, the Allies stockpiled millions of tons of mustard gas and other chemical weapons just behind the frontlines in the event of an Axis gas attack. In December of 1943, an American supply ship laden with 2,000 mustard gas shells was damaged in an air raid off Bari, Italy. Much of the mortiferous cargo seeped into the waters. More than 600 American personnel were exposed to the gas and 60 died. An unknown number of Italian civilians too perished. Centrolineal commanders suppressed the whole story for fright the Germans might resort to chemic weapons in response.
• Mustard gas was used in anger during the 1960s in the Northward Yemen ceremonious war. Twenty years later, Saddam Hussein outraged the earth by dropping it on both the Iranian army and Iraq'south own Kurdish population. More than than 5,000 civilians died in a mustard gas attack on the city of Halabja in 1988.
• Mustard gas continues to do impairment to this day. Abased stockpiles of the agent are frequently discovered and oft hurt those who stumble across information technology. In 2002, archeologists disturbed a lost assignment of mustard gas while performing an earthworks at the Presidio in San Francisco. In 2010, a fishing trawler inadvertently dredged upwards some vintage gas shells from the lesser of the Atlantic off New York. Several of the crew were burned past the toxin and hospitalized.
• Despite it's fearsome reputation as a weapon, mustard gas has as well saved lives. Afterward Earth War 2, medical researchers who were aware of sulfur mustard's prison cell-destroying properties fashioned the first cancer-fighting chemotherapy treatments from mustard gas. [6] Yet, these express benefits inappreciably outweigh the weapon'south legacy of horror.
i. Gilbert, Martin. "The First World War. 1994. Pg. 346.
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulfur_mustard
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulfur_mustard
iv. http://science.howstuffworks.com/mustard-gas3.htm
v. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/399601/mustard-gas
6. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/399601/mustard-gas
OTHER SOURCES
http://science.howstuffworks.com/mustard-gas.htm
http://world wide web.bt.cdc.gov/amanuensis/sulfurmustard/basics/facts.asp
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/FWWmustard.htm
http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/poison_gas_and_world_war_one.htm
http://militaryhistorynow.com/2012/12/12/fighting-muddy-chemical-warfares-worst-offenders/
http://news.bbc.co.united kingdom/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/march/16/newsid_4304000/4304853.stm
Related
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Source: https://militaryhistorynow.com/2014/02/11/slow-burn-11-terrifying-facts-about-mustard-gas/
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