Giving Up on Mystery Odor Source

The mystery odor will remain just that - a mystery.

City and state officials have given up on trying to trace the source of the mystery odor that wafted over New York City and parts of New Jersey last week, even as a mystery odor of unknown source hit Staten Island today. The leading theories were swamp gas, mercaptan, and sewer gas. The officials say that without any other leads or another mystery odor outbreak, there's no way to ever know what caused it.

That's not exactly comforting, but I hope that the officials studied the reports and air patterns to get a better understanding of what might happen if the odor wasn't simply a nasty smell, but a chemical or biological agent. Emergency response ought to examine the matter more closely as well to see how to improve responses to these kinds of incidents. If anything, officials could treat this as a dress rehearsal for a mass casualty attack over a wide area.