Antiterror Test to Follow Winds
and Determine Airborne Paths
By Ian Urbin - NY Times - 11 February 2005
Jerry Allwine will probably receive some crooked stares next month
as he traverses tall rooftops near Madison Square Garden and releases
mysterious gases over Midtown Manhattan.
Not to worry. He is here to help.
Mr. Allwine, an engineer with the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
in Richland, Wash., is one of the directors on a team of about 50
scientists and emergency planners that will release a harmless gas
sometime between March 7 and March 21 to study how air might flow
through the city in the event of a terrorist attack or an accident
involving toxic chemicals.
The team, which began planning the study this week with the city's
Office of Emergency Management, will place 31 battery-powered air
samplers on rooftops and sidewalks within a half-mile of the Garden.
The resulting data will be used to develop better computer models
for simulating the movements of airborne hazards.
The study is part of the Urban Dispersion Program, a $10 million
project sponsored by the Homeland Security, Defense and Energy Departments
that began in 2004 and will end in 2007.
On a day with gentle winds and no rain, the team will release six
different gases into the air from separate locations, allowing the
scientists to know where each one came from.
The team will track the gases using tracer samplers, which consist
of a breadbox-size container sometimes mounted on a long pole or
tripod. Inside the box is a battery-powered pump that fills about
20 plastic bags with air at predetermined sampling times. The team
will hang 21 of the samplers from light poles; the 10 others will
be set on rooftops. The team will also place wind vanes and other
equipment on rooftops and sidewalks to measure the direction, speed
and moisture of the air.
Mr. Allwine said the six gases being used are collectively called
perfluorocarbon tracers, which he said are colorless, odorless and
entirely safe. These gases are ideal for the project because they
can be detected at very low levels, he said. The same gases have
also been used in meteorological tests since the late 1960's, he
said, and more recently by utilities for detecting pipe leaks.
"Our aim is to begin to understand how atmospheric dispersion
occurs," said Tony Fainberg, an official at the Directorate
for Science and Technology, a division of the Department of Homeland
Security. "And we believe that if you can figure out this complicated
phenomena for New York City, with its deep urban canyons and its
unpredictable air flows, then you can figure it out anywhere."
The results of the study, which is financed entirely with federal
funds, will be shared with local emergency officials, said Jarrod
N. Bernstein, a spokesman for the city's Office of Emergency Management.
With that knowledge, emergency officials will have a better idea
of how much of the city might be affected by a terrorist attack.
"For example, if a tanker truck carrying toxic gases crashes
downtown or a terrorist releases anthrax in the air, you want to
be able to start predicting the places that are downwind,"
Mr. Fainberg said. "With computer modeling you can start to
figure out whether to tell people to get off the streets immediately
or to stay inside. You can also start figuring out where to send
the ambulance, police and Fire Department."
With better information, he added, "you can avoid having people
running into the plume instead of away from it."
Paul J. Browne, a spokesman for the New York Police Department,
said the study would be helpful but noted that the city already
has extensive monitoring systems to catch problems before they occur.
The national Biowatch system in the city consists of a number of
machines, checked daily, that register biological hazards, he said.
The city also has about 900 police sergeants who are assigned to
carry pager-size devices that detect radioactivity, he added.
Aside from having samplers on rooftops and light poles, 12 of the
federal team's scientists will track the gases by walking the blocks
near the Garden with pen-size samplers clipped to their lapels.
Twenty-five students from the New York City College of Technology
and Medgar Evers College, both in Brooklyn, will also help in setting
up the sidewalk samplers and rooftop wind vanes, which will be completed
in the first week of March.
Further field studies are scheduled for August 2005 and March 2006.
Those tests will cover a larger area of New York City, and tracking
instruments will be used inside certain buildings to monitor the
exchange between outdoor and indoor air.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/
Antiterror Test to Follow Winds and Determine Airborne Paths
By IAN URBINA
Published: February 11, 2005
A team of about 50 scientists and emergency planners will release
a harmless gas to study how air might flow through New York City
in the event of a terrorist attack.
Antiterror Test to Follow Winds and Determine Airborne Paths. Mr.
Allwine, an engineer with the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
in Richland, Wash., is one of the directors on a team of about 50
scientists and emergency planners that will release a harmless gas
sometime between March 7 and March 21 to study how air might flow
through the city in the event of a terrorist attack or an accident
involving toxic chemicals. New York Times. 11 February 2005. [related
story] [Registration Required]
Patricia A. Doyle, PhD
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