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Opiate gas determined to have killed Russian hostages

Daisybabe

Daisybabe

Bluelight Crew
Joined
Sep 21, 2000
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South Florida
[I thought about posting this in the Drugs in the Media forum, but I figured you all mighe be more interested. -Daisy]
Times, World News
October 29, 2002
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-462171,00.html
German survivors provide clue to deadly theatre gas
By Daniel McGrory
DOCTORS who are treating two German survivors of the Moscow theatre siege believe that they may have identified the gas used by Russian special forces. After examining an 18-year-old woman student and a 43-year-old businessman who were knocked out by the powerful drug, experts at a clinic in Munich believe that a narcotic called fentanyl could have killed the 115 hostages.
The drug is often found in powerful pain-killing body patches used by cancer sufferers. It is also sought by heroin addicts as it is an opiate similar to morphine and is very strong in its pure state. Experts at the Pentagon said yesterday that they also strongly suspected that an opium-based drug had been used, but would not say if American doctors had tested any of the survivors.
Thomas Zilker, a toxicology expert at the specialist German clinic, ruled out a nerve gas, as it would have left traces in the victims' bodies, which he had been unable to find. He said that the gas was probably something that the Russians had developed for themselves, but he was having difficulty finding information because of Russian "mystery-mongering".
Russian officials were maintaining their mystery last night, although a top aide of President Putin insisted that the purpose of the raid "was not to kill everyone, and so the use of sarin or any other poison gas can be ruled out". Viktor Fominykh, the Russian presidency's top medical official, added: "Consequently it is not essential to know its composition exactly in order to provide treatment." Bombarded by questions, Dr Fominykh admitted that not even he had been told the precise composition of the gas pumped into the auditorium.
The Russians were reluctant to allow foreign embassies to airlift the injured, to prevent independent examinations, but Professor Zilker and his team at the Munich Klinikum Rechts Der Isar said it was "strongly indicated" that the two German survivors had consumed an unknown quantity of a synthetic narcotic with chlorinated hydrocarbons, including fentanyl.
He said that there was a very fine line between an appropriate dose of an anesthetic and a potentially fatal overdose leading to suffocation. "You wouldn't really have the opportunity to regulate the dosage in such a large theatre," he said. It was possible that so much gas had been pumped into the theatre that there had not been enough oxygen.
Andy Oppenheimer, a nuclear and biological weapons expert with Janes Defence Weekly, said that fentanyl was an anesthetic and was used as an alternative to morphine, but had never been used as a chemical weapon before. He said it was "very likely" that the Russians were reluctant to reveal the type of substance used because it would alert the US to their experimentation with it as a chemical weapon.
"These have not been outlawed by the Convention on Chemical Weapons," he said. "There are grey areas in the way these gases can be used and the Russians may be exploiting this to be able to develop chemical weapons without contravening international law. The symptoms caused by fentanyl in this context would have been vomiting, disorientation and a collapse of the respiratory system."
Fentanyl was first synthesized in Belgium in the late 1950s and has been used in clinical practice since the 1960s. It is an exceptionally potent analgesic for use in heart surgery. Illegal use of the drug first appeared in the mid-1970s among the medical profession and quickly spread to other drug-users. Its biological effect is indistinguishable from that of heroin, with the exception that it may be hundreds of times more potent.
Doctors in Moscow say they are treating the former hostages with naloxone, a product used for the treatment of secondary respiratory ailments.
 
I guessed it on the first day :)
I think it is kind of amusing in a sick sort of way, all the heroin addicts get to live because of their tolerance, and all the people without tolerance die :P (btw, russia has a LOT of heroin addicts)
 
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i totally agree. i remember the first thought that came to my mind was "i bet i would have walked out of there with a smile on m face." it my be a fucked up thing to think but whatever opiate they had those people inhale must have been pretty damn good......and therefore i could not help feeling just a little bit jealous. right or wrong i love my opiates.
 
I find this hard to believe! If it was fentanyl then why are people still dying several days later???
 
cause its fentanyl and it lasts up to 12-24 hours depending on the way it was taken. if it was inhaled it was put out of the body quicker then if u used the actiq lollipops or the fentanyl patches.
 
Me too, I don't think its fentanyl. I read people were speaking about a valium or barbituate gass....this is all stupid. I acknoledge the possibility but...
I imagine a fentanyl derivative like carfentanyl could be made into an aerosol form, but there are other more efficient and CHEAPER substances to be used...
Personally, I think it was some non-flammable ether derivative, like flurane, halothane etc. But who knows......the russians dont seem to....just because they used naloxone to treat them, doesnt mean it was an opiod....
 
My news told me it was BZ, which is an bad-trip sorta hallicenogen used in veitman as a "non-lethal" chemical agent.
 
Russia Used Opiate Fentanyl
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, October 30, 2002; 12:54 PM
MOSCOW, Oct. 30 – The Russian Ministry of Health late today said the mystery gas that killed more than 100 of the hostages at a Moscow theater during a rescue attempt last weekend was an opiate-based form of the drug fentanyl, a disclosure coming days after Western experts first identified the substance.
The official acknowlegment came even as the death toll from use of the gas rose by two to 117. Two other hostages were killed by gunfire, according to Moscow health officials, in the course of a 58-hour standoff with Chechen guerrillas that ended with a dramatic pre-dawn raid Saturday.
In an evening news conference, a defensive Health Minister Yuri Shevchenko acknowledged that the gas was based on derivatives of fentanyl, a commonly used anesthetic, saying it was deployed to "neutralize the terrorists." Despite the large number of fatalities, he denied that doctors were ill-prepared to handle the consequences for the hundreds of civilian-hostages in the theater, and he stressed that Russia's use of the gas did not violate the international ban on chemical weapons.
As dozens of the dead were buried today, Danish authorities in Copenhagen announced they had arrested a top aide of Chechen separatist leader Aslan Maskhadov, saying he may have been involved in the Moscow hostage-taking and other terrorist attacks. Akhmed Zakayev was detained late Tuesday, Danish authorities said, after attending the final session of the World Chechen Congress being held in the Danish capital – a gathering that drew outrage from Russia, coming right after the Moscow theater siege.
A Danish judge ordered Zakayev held until Nov. 12, pending investigation.
Here in Moscow, authorities said they have rounded up "dozens" of suspects who may have been accomplices in the hostage-taking, even as liberal politicians from the Union of Right Forces lost their bid today to open a special parliamentary commission to determine how such a large, heavily-armed group of Chechens could mount such an attack in the center of the Russian capital.
But the main outstanding questions here have concerned the mystery gas, and whether Moscow medical authorities were not ready to handle the hundreds of casualties because of official secrecy surrounding the gas.
At the news conference, Shevchenko adamantly denied that was the case. He said 1,000 antidotes for the gas – he did not name the specific chemical compounds that were used – had been on hand for medical personnel to use after the raid.
"Specialists, in particular myself, had been warned even though the operation had to be carried out on short notice," Shevchenko said. He denied reports from doctors who treated the hostages that many more could have been saved if adequate resources were available on the scene, and listed many of the after-effects suffered by the hostages as a result of the gas, including hypoxia, prolonged oxygen deficit and dehydration.
At the same news conference, Moscow Prosecutor Mikhail Avdyukov pledged a thorough investigation into the deaths of the hostages. "We are not going to conceal anything," he said.
But for days, that is exactly what the Russian authorities have done. They refused to tell doctors in Moscow city hospitals who were treating the patients details of the gas that was used, barred hundreds of panicked relatives from seeing their surviving loved ones, and maintained a steadfast silence even after Western experts first identified the gas.
For many observers here, such behavior had echoes of the Soviet past. "We know the truth now, but it's too late to save the patients," said Liliya Shevtstova, a political analyst at the Carnegie Moscow Center. "It's a typical Soviet reaction, where the individual is nothing and the state is everything. Their assumption is that this is a state secret."
President Vladimir Putin has spoken twice to the nation in the aftermath of the hostage crisis. Late Saturday, he asked forgiveness for those the raid failed to save, but he has yet to say anything about the gas and why it was used.
In remarks Tuesday, U.S. Ambassador Alexander Vershbow criticized Russia for keeping secret the type of gas used and said the failure to inform Russian doctors about it may have cost lives. "It's clear that perhaps with a little more information at least a few more of the hostages would have survived."
A Russian doctor who has been treating the hostages at a Moscow hospital agreed that the failure to prepare a better rescue plan led to many of the deaths. "If people were intubated and helped to breathe with artificial ventilation while still in the vehicles being brought to the hospitals, almost everyone would have survived," he said in an interview Tuesday, asking not to be identified for fear of reprisals. All of those who died, he added, were already dead by the time they arrived at his hospital.
According to U.S. experts, fentanyl belongs to a group of medicines called narcotic analgesics that suppress breathing. While similar to morphine and Demerol, medical specialists said fentanyl is 100 times more potent than morphine. A normal dosage goes to the brain but is then redistributed quickly to the rest of the body, making it a short-acting anesthesia. But a larger dose does not redistribute as well, remaining concentrated in the brain and shutting down respiratory functions. The drug naxolone counteracts its effects, but would have had to be administered by Russian rescue workers within minutes.
Correspondent Peter Baker contributed to this story.
[ 30 October 2002: Message edited by: Banquo ]
 
notice it said derivatives of fentanyl! And I still do not believe that was the only chemical. More than likely they just addi it to some chemical that has been band to cover it up!
And if it is fentanyl, how can I get them to come spray my house!!!
 
they explained why people were dying days after, read it closely. Just hope that if your ever in a hostage situation , you have the privlage to have fentanyl gas instead of the nasty shit that is usually used.
 
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