Science: Bomb Bother

Britons were confronted with a seemingly unsolvable problem last week — what to do with vast stocks of poison gas piled up — and unused — in World War II.

Stored all over England are thousands & thousands (the exact figures are a military secret) of deadly 500-lb. gas bombs. For anything but killing, the gas is useless. Some of it is so lethal that it kills in 30 seconds; nurses must stand ready with first aid near the workers who manufacture it. British chemists have considered various schemes:

¶ Dump the bombs in the ocean? (A messy — and possibly dangerous...