Word: donora
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...sooty materials to the atmosphere, in addition to gaseous compounds of nitrogen and sulfur oxides and a variety of toxic elements including, for example, mercury. The effluents from coal burning have a demonstrably negative effect on human health. It took a series of air pollution disasters, however, in Donora, Penn., and in London in the late 1940s and early 1950s before public opinion was aroused to a level requiring action. We learned later about the problems of acid rain and photochemical smog...
Davis’ speech touched on her personal experience as a child in the smoggy town of Donora, Penn.—where the smokestacks killed twenty people and sickened thousands more...
Davis said that for many workers, towns like Donora could be a mixed blessing. The smoke could kill you or harm your children, she said, but at the same time “smoke meant money and smoke meant jobs...
...hours, and there is a break of at least a few more hours before another inversion occurs. As the air grows more polluted, however, environmentalists fear the creation of a lethal inversion that remains fixed for days -- like the one that killed 20 people in the smokestack town of Donora, Pa., in 1948 or the killer fog that claimed the lives of 4,000 people in London in 1952. Even with the closure of the Azcapotzalco refinery, both Mexico's government and its industry will have to work harder at controlling pollution for years to come before the people...
Chief culprits in the Donora, London and New York smog disasters were probably sulphur dioxide and sulphur trioxide, which, either in gaseous form or converted into sulphuric-acid mist, can irritate the skin, eyes and upper respiratory tract. Extreme exposure, such as might occur in an industrial accident, can do irreparable damage to the lungs-and even attack the enamel on teeth...