“GASSED” TANKS.

Taihape Daily Times, 25 March 1919, Page 3

“GASSED” TANKS.

AN AMERICAN YARN. An ingenious defence against tank attacks, which momentarily put an end to their usefulness, was used by the Germans some time ago, according to Paul 8. B'aley, an American writer, in the New York Illustrated World. The German method of knocking out the tanks, says Mr Baley, was by the use of gas—employed not against the pilots .and gunners running the tanks, but against the motor mechanism of the tanks themselves, paralysing them and putting them out of action. In the neighbourhood of the advancing .tanks tons land tons of uwielfdy projectiles were dropped. These were apparently innocuous enough in their action. Each one exploded with a noise no louder than that made by a small c,alibied pistol. Not suspecting anything terribly dangerous, the tanks continued on their way mcthojdicaily. Then they stopped, and were battered to pieces by enemy guns. Each- of the impotent looking projectiles was a carbon-dioxidj bomb, fired from a hand motor. On bursting each projectile filled the atmosphere in that vicinity with a tremendous amount of gas. “Now, earbomjdioxid gas is not really dangerous to human life. It is only when the oxygon is vitiated in a stuffy room that it really has the ability to do much harm. “The gas did not inconvenience the drivers or gunnels inside the tanks in the least. It simply stopped the engines ! “Mlow this was done can be understood! readily when it is remembered that a tank is nothing but an armoured fort set down on top of a gasolinetruck chassis. As long as the gas motor runs the tank can move. When

it stops the tank is immovable. No gasoline engine can deliver an explosive mixture to the carburretor in an .atmosphere of carbon-dioxid. When the air becomes filled with this gas the tanks become useless.” According to the writer, the fact that attacks were subsequently made bv tanks could only mean one thing, and that was that the Allies ha\3 evolved a gas-mask rendering tanks immune from tlic new German gas attacks.