It was supposed to be humane.
You strap the condemned down to a chair, then seal him in an airtight chamber.
Finally, once the time has come for the prisoner's life to come to an end, lethal gas is pumped
into the room, ensuring a speedy, and painless death.
A humane approach to the death penalty for society's most violent criminals- only turns
out that death in the gas chamber is anything but painless, and far from humane.
In the early 20th century most states in the US were still hanging people, which if you've
seen our previous episodes on worst punishments, you'll know that hanging very often didn't
quite go to plan.
On paper, it seems simple.
You hoist the condemned up on a gallows, put a noose around their neck, and then drop them
through a trapdoor.
Contrary to popular opinion, the condemned didn't die from asphyxiation, but rather from
the sudden drop snapping their neck.
A clean, fast death.
Except it hardly ever went to plan, and when hanging went wrong, it went real wrong.
Like when ‘Kendell Jenner solved racism by drinking Pepsi’ wrong.
For starters, dropping a prisoner from too large a height would end up with the head
being popped clean off like a champagne cork, showering curious bystanders with a fountain
of gore.
Drop them from too low and the neck wouldn't break, leaving everyone staring awkwardly
for several minutes as the condemned very slowly choked to death.
Clearly there had to be a better solution, and this is where the government turned to
gas.
Once more, on paper, it seems like a simple, clean death.
A lethal gas is pumped into an airtight room and the prisoner lapses into unconsciousness
and soon thereafter, a painless death.
Once more, the reality was anything but the humane death that was hoped for.
So how does execution by lethal gas work, and how does it go so very wrong?
First, you have to decide on a type of gas to be used.
Executions can go with either a poisonous gas or an asphyxiant gas.
A poisonous gas typically kills by causing massive organ failure, shutting down vital
organs and bringing on death.
An asphyxiant gas simply makes it difficult for the lungs to get enough oxygen, or blocks
the absorption of oxygen into the bloodstream.
During World War II the Nazis, probably the most infamous mass gassers in history, used
carbon monoxide to asphyxiate dozens of people at a time.
This had the advantage of making cleanup and transportation of the gas safe and simple-
typically the gas was created on the spot by running a large engine fed by diesel or
gasoline, but manufactured carbon monoxide was also produced to try and speed up the
killing process.
It was still a slow process however, with executions sometimes taking up to a half hour
or more to complete.
Zyklon B, originally used as a pesticide, was rapidly found to be a superior solution.
Unlike carbon monoxide which kills by asphyxiation, Zyklon B directly attacks the body's cells,
shutting down organs and bringing death in as little as two minutes.
At the same time that fumigators in the US were using Zyklon B to keep insect pests under
control, the Nazis were using it to run the largest mass murder operation in history.
The United States opted for the use of Sodium Cyanide for its executions, which was believed
to be a fast and pain free method of death.
The procedure was simple: the prisoner was strapped into a chair placed in an airtight
chamber (use photo https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8f/Santa_Fe_gas_chamber.jpg).
Underneath the chair would be a container filled with sulfuric acid and distilled water.
Then from the safety of the outside of the chamber, the executioner would pull a lever
causing sodium cyanide crystals to drop into the water-acid solution, releasing hydrocyanic
gas.
The inmate would have been instructed to breathe in deeply, so as to hasten unconsciousness.
However, most inmates would hold their breath as long as they could.
Regardless, at some point the victim would go unconscious, as the cyanide entered their
body and the cyanide ions bound to the iron atoms inside the mitochondria of living cells.
This bonding would prevent cellular respiration, leading to the shutdown of the body's organs.
Death at the cellular level, what could possibly go wrong with that?
Turns out, a lot of things.
As has been discovered with lethal injection, with some executions taking up to a whopping
two hours, each person's biology is different, and people's bodies can react in extremely
unpredictable ways.
Of over 600 executions by gas in the United States, so many of these would go so significantly
wrong that at one point a prison warden commented that if he was forced to kill another inmate
with gas, he would quit his job.
Inmates would be seen drooling and moaning long after they should've been unconscious.
On september 2nd, 1983, Jimmy Lee Gray was executed by lethal gas, and after eight minutes
of moaning and banging his head against a pipe, the viewing room was cleared by prison
officials.
It's unknown just how long it took for him to actually die.
In 1960, Caryl Chessman told reporters he would nod his head if he felt pain during
his execution.
Chessman would nod his head for several minutes as he moaned behind the thick glass, until
at last falling unconscious.
Pain and unconsciousness are difficult things to study, so it's not known exactly how death
by lethal gas is as painful as it apparently is.
Experts however believe that the sensation of death by gas is similar to the extreme
pain of a heart attack, only extended over several minutes at a time as the gas slowly
works to bring death.
After so many horror stories from gas chamber executions, the method has been largely banned
in the United States, with the last execution by gas chamber taking place in 1999.
Today prisoners can still get the gas chamber in Arizona, California, Maryland, Mississippi,
Missouri, and Wyoming, though only if lethal injection cannot be administered.
With the effectiveness of lethal injection also in serious question however, states are
once more looking for a new, and humane method of execution.
Now go check out How Does Lethal Injection Work?
What Happens If It Fails?
Or click this other video instead!