Odor of A's fans used for U.S. terror test

[Roy31]

As fans marched into McAfee Coliseum to see the Oakland A's play the Detroit Tigers and the Los Angeles Angels recently, scientists working for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security were sniffing them -- their popcorn, cigars, hairspray and aftershave, according to the CONTRA COSTA TIMES.

The scientists, sent from Sandia National Laboratories, wondered whether they could catch a whiff of a terrorist chemical attack in this morass of smells. Their conclusion: Athletics' fans might be among baseball's rowdiest, but they're a pretty clean bunch and so is their stadium ... or at least neither is lethally bad smelling.

Sandia's chemical engineers had feared worse, especially for a stadium in the heart of an industrial neighborhood with Interstate 880 next door. Enough ambient odors and chemicals could swamp or confuse detectors tuned to sniff out sarin and VX gas at concentrations down to the parts per trillion.

As molecules, garden pesticides are near twins to deadly poisons.

"We were very pleased with the background at the coliseum," said Ben Wu, project manager for Sandia's "rapidly deployable chemical detection system." "It was very clean based on what we were expecting."


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[Nanuk]

Give me a break. Next they will be in public toilets!