HELIUM GAS

Evening Post, Volume CXXIII, Issue 124, 27 May 1937, Page 9

HELIUM GAS

EXPORT FROM U.S.A.

MODIFICATION OF LAW URGED

WASHINGTON, May 25.

A Cabinet committee of five has: recommended to President Roosevelt the modification of legislation affecting helium to permit the export of the gas for other than military purposes.

Dr.: Hugo Eckener, designer of the Zeppelin Hindenburg, which crashed in flames recently at Lakehurst, has arrived to give evidence before the Senate Committee on Wednesday.

Mr. Thomas Slate, inventor of the all-metal dirigible, warned the Cabinet sub-committee that Germany wanted helium for military use. He said that Dr. Eckener was the. unwilling tool of German militarists.

Helium is a gas which is present throughout the atmosphere in very small quantity,, and can also be ex* tracted 'from certain rocks, again in very small quantities. Its existence was first realised when, the spectrum of the sun's light showed the presence, in the solar atmosphere, of a hitherto Unknown gaseous element, which was named helium, from "helios," the Greek wprd for the sun. Research workers succeeded in finding the same gas in the atmosphere. Helium will not burn, and though it is twice as heavy as hydrogen, it is still so light that, being non-explosive, it is ideal for filling airships. Helium was discovered .to exist in very large: quantities as a natural gas, which comes from the Texas oil country, so that the United States has complete control over the world's, supply of the gas.