“The Big Stink”

Blame for what is now being called “the Big Stink” is pinned on New Jersey, that old standby:

Blame the big stink on New Jersey.
The mighty stench that blanketed swaths of the city, forced building and school evacuations, disrupted commuter train service – and even stoked fears of a terrorist attack – appears to have come from the other side of the Hudson River.

While the exact source and cause of the odor is still not clear, Charles Sturcken of the city Department of Environmental Protection said the agency was “pretty sure it came from New Jersey.”

Specifically, the heavily industrialized Hudson County waterfront with its chemical plants and port terminals as well as the Secaucus area, Sturcken said. Seven people in the Garden State were briefly hospitalized as a result of exposure to the stench.

Sewell Chan also smelt it:

Adding to the alarm was the strength and duration of the odor, which may have been aggravated by a weather phenomenon known as a temperature inversion. Inversions, which often occur when a warm front moves over a cooler, denser air mass, cause the temperature closer to the ground to be cooler and the air higher up to be warmer — a reversal of the usual pattern. Inversions can trap pollutants and odors, preventing them from being dispersed upward.

David Wally, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service’s forecast office in Upton, N.Y., said a warm front approached the city between 7 and 8 a.m., making it “very possible” that an inversion trapped the pollutants and gaseous odor closer to the ground. The inversion eroded later in the morning, he said.

. . .

Michael Williams, an accountant in Jersey City, said he delayed taking a smoking break for more than an hour because the odor was so intense. “I didn’t want to spark an explosion or anything,” he said.

Earlier on The Big Stink: Another Mystery Smell . . .,
Finally, The Gas Has Passed.