739
Kenneth Smith ‘struggled for life’ for 22 minutes in Alabama nitrogen gas execution: Updates
(www.independent.co.uk)
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 26 Jan 2024
739 points (93.6% liked)
News
36221 readers
322 users here now
Welcome to the News community!
Rules:
1. Be civil
Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.
2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.
Obvious biased sources will be removed at the mods’ discretion. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted separately but not to the post body. Sources may be checked for reliability using Wikipedia, MBFC, AdFontes, GroundNews, etc.
3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.
Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.
4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source. Clickbait titles may be removed.
Posts which titles don’t match the source may be removed. If the site changed their headline, we may ask you to update the post title. Clickbait titles use hyperbolic language and do not accurately describe the article content. When necessary, post titles may be edited, clearly marked with [brackets], but may never be used to editorialize or comment on the content.
5. Only recent news is allowed.
Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.
6. All posts must be news articles.
No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials, videos, blogs, press releases, or celebrity gossip will be allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis. Mods may use discretion to pre-approve videos or press releases from highly credible sources that provide unique, newsworthy content not available or possible in another format.
7. No duplicate posts.
If an article has already been posted, it will be removed. Different articles reporting on the same subject are permitted. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.
8. Misinformation is prohibited.
Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.
9. No link shorteners or news aggregators.
All posts must link to original article sources. You may include archival links in the post description. News aggregators such as Yahoo, Google, Hacker News, etc. should be avoided in favor of the original source link. Newswire services such as AP, Reuters, or AFP, are frequently republished and may be shared from other credible sources.
10. Don't copy entire article in your post body
For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
There are many accounts of workers accidentally entering confined spaces that have been purged with nitrogen and they were all unconscious in seconds. (OSHA records). If it took the prison 22 MINUTES to execute this guy, then they totally botched that execution.
The gas mixture clearly had oxygen still in it. If he's gasping for air for 22 minutes, he was still receiving low amounts of O2.
Yeah I think when an airplane depressurizes at high altitude it's something like 5 minutes and people are unconscious. And people just act like drunken idiots after one minute.
Remember in the event of depressurization, put your own mask on before helping others. Because you're likely to be a just complete idiot that's just getting in the way if your brain isn't properly oxygenated.
But anyway... yeah these guys fucked up. A big problem with executions that people don't talk about is that there isn't a lot of overlap on the Venn diagram of people that are competent enough to perform an execution vs. the people who are willing to perform an execution.
Not defending what they did, but he was probably unconscious. His body was fighting for its life.
Quite the assumption
Unconscious doesn't mean not suffering.
It kinda does though?
Cum doesn't mean someone came
^Facts
78% of the air you and everyone breathes is nitrogen you dumb shit.
And that's why, when you remove that critical 21% of oxygen, your body doesn't realize it's suffocating. You breath normally but pass out really quickly since your brain has nothing to burn.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inert_gas_asphyxiation?wprov=sfla1
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarco_pod?wprov=sfla1
Some reporter from Salon, or Wire - some big site like that - participated in a controlled nitrogen hypoxia experiment on himself, and wrote about it. It was really interesting, but search engines are flooded with that Alabama execution, and I lost interest in searching for it.
If you can find it https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1228865 is a good watch. It covers other methods, but it becomes clear how fast, effective, and painless nitrogen asphyxiation can be, as the presenter has to receive assistance in order not to die while attempting to get close to the experience (without dying).
It's also a bit sad, as it makes it clear that for at least some capital punishment advocates, suffering is a desired part of the outcome.
I'd like to avoid death, but I can foresee a potential future when my quality of life is negative and no amount of volunteer effort can bring it positive. If that happens, I'd like to opt-in to mortality via inert gas (probably nitrogen) asphyxiation.
If we must have capital punishment, inert gas asphyxiation seems to be the best known way to do it. I'm not convinced we must have capital punishment, tho.
Nice! I hadn't seen that.
People are going to need to die in controlled ways; whether in believing some people should be murdered by the State, or in believing people should be allowed to end their own lives, there are few Americans who don't fall somewhere outside of the set of people who think there is never a case for controlled human death. Most of those people are probably Amish, or some branch thereof.
Alabama clearly fucked this one up - I guess that's what happens when you drive all of the STEM folks out of your state. There was no reason - other than wanting a person to suffer, as you said - for it to have gone so wrong. Justified or not, if I were to ever find myself in that chair, asphixiation by ~~nitrous~~ nitrogen is absolutely the way I'd want to go. And that's the most basic measure of humanity we need: do unto others.
Edit: typo
I agree with you but please note it is nitrogen, not nitrous, being discussed.
But -- nitrous (N2O) is more fun and has just as little usable oxygen -- zero
For easy access to an inert gas at-home, try a helium tank from the Party Store
Yeah, that was a mistype. I mean, nitrous might be fun, but I meant nitrogen.
Thanks for pointing that out!
Found on Vimeo: link
If download preferred: via swisstransfer.com
Is this bait? Lol
Water is also 33% oxygen but I dare you to try to breathe it
Fun fact for friendly posters: companies that make gas detectors use lots of nitrogen because it’s a great “zero” gas. That is, 100% dry nitrogen equates to “nothing there” on sensors for all kinds of gases.
Including oxygen sensors! Did you know in air they measure 20.8% and in nitrogen they measure zero point zero?
What are you even hinting at? That breathing 100% nitrogen is fine??