Thanks for keeping us safe, Rumsfeld

[Dagobahn Eagle]

Family seals bedroom with plastic sheets and duct tape and die from lack of oxygen. Good job, Department of Homeland Security Suffocation:usa:! Damned good job indeed!

 

Reminds me of when FOX "News" urged viewers to "stay inside [and not] eat or drink anything!":rolleyes:. What's next, I wonder.

 

Your country's going to the dogs:(.

[ZBomber]

Dude.... its not their fault... its the ****in peoples fault... how stupid can you be to actually stop all sources of ventilation from getting into a room?

[IG-64]

You'd think someone would've gotten up and thought, hey, you know what, I can't freakin' breathe, I think I'll go open the window.

[Samnmax221]

There is the wonderful personal responsibility factor, I wonder if they got a Darwin award?

[BongoBob]

As much funa s it is to blame america or bush or government etc, this was their fault.

[Datheus]

You'd think someone would've gotten up and thought, hey, you know what, I can't freakin' breathe, I think I'll go open the window.

The problem is that it's gradual. I'm sure you've heard the whole "If you drop a frog in boiling water, it jumps out. If you turn up the heat, it cooks alive."

 

Suffocating in that manner is different from simply holding your breath. A person can easily notice such a drastic change. You'd probably feel more and more tired and less and less oxygen was in your system.

 

Also, keep in mind that these people were already asleep. Chances are it was actually a rather peacful death as far as death goes.

[Darth Groovy]

This thread is getting packed up and shipped to the Senate.

[Dagobahn Eagle]

So it did end up in the Senate after all, hm? Very well.

 

Well, besides from the fact that if the authorities hadn't suggested they do they, they'd probably never have done it, it's not as stupid as it sounds, in my opinion. A bedroom does have a lot of oxygen, after all, and shouldn't run out even with several people inside. You have to admit, the idea of the AC sucking all the air out does sound a little far-fetched. Would you have believed it?

 

So in my opinion, it comes down to the authorities giving an advice that was at best worthless, and at worst life-threatening.

 

And as a side note, as Datheus said: It's a gradual thing. How exactly it feels to be awake in a room draining of oxygen I don't know, but if you're asleep, and the change is gradual enough, there's little chance you'll notice.

[Samnmax221]

I'm thinking if you wake up in a room with remarkably low oxygen (although there probebly wouldn't be enough for the brain to wake you up) you'de be too drowsy to get up anyway.

[edlib]

Um... these weren't even Americans:

 

"In mid-March 2003 the Associated Press reported on the demise by suffocation of three Israeli Arabs (a woman and her two teenage sons) in the town of Kfar Kassem, all of whom had spent the night in a room of the family home which had been sealed with plastic sheeting and duct tape against a possible Iraqi chemical missile attack.

 

Police said the three lost their lives because a coal-fueled heater in an adjacent room sucked oxygen from the room they were sleeping in, which was designed to stop air from entering but allowed air to escape. Around 5 a.m., the husband awoke and realized his wife and their two teens (ages 13 and 14) were not breathing, police said. Their two younger children (ages 3 and 4) survived."

 

But I don't know anyone who ran out to grab duct tape and plastic sheeting after that recommendation, anyway.

 

Besides, I live in the Northeast, where the majority of houses are a bit old and drafty to begin with... I very much doubt very much you could ever seal one of these types of homes well enough to ever make a difference. Although the more paranoid among us just might try...

[rccar328]

Last I heard, the reccomendation was to buy plastic sheeting and duct tape to be put up in the case of a chemical weapons attack...but seeing as how this was a family of "Israeli Arabs" (quoted from the Snopes article), I don't really see what Rumsfeld has to do with their deaths.

 

And as far as it goes, which is more life-threatening: dying of suffocation in a plastic-sealed room, or dying from a chemical weapon attack? At least suffocation is gradual: you have some kind of chance that wind or natural dissipation will allow you to come out of your bubble before you die of suffocation. If you breathe in nerve gas, you're dead, period.

[Datheus]

Breathing is overrated anyway.

[ET Warrior]

which is more life-threatening: dying of suffocation in a plastic-sealed room, or dying from a chemical weapon attack?

Last I checked...dying was dying. Death from suffocation and death from chemical weapons are both 100% fatal.

[Rogue15]

it's canada's fault.

[rccar328]

Last I checked...dying was dying. Death from suffocation and death from chemical weapons are both 100% fatal.

All I was saying is that you have more of a chance of survival in the sealed room...it was just poorly worded.

[TK-8252]

Perhaps this Lewis Black quote serves this situation very well:

 

"Our government told us we could protect ourselves from a CHEMICAL ATTACK... with duct tape. I think that a group of Americans should have been sent to Washington on our behalf. And they would take everyone, from the President on down, out for an afternoon of electroshock. Duct tape?! The only way duct tape helps is if you can get enough that you can wrap it around yourself and suffocate before the chemicals kill you."