Local News

Feds put freeze on Boston’s rat-killing experiment

Pictured last spring, Chris McNally, of the city of Boston's Inspectional Services, fills rat burrows with dry ice to exterminate them at the Central Burying Ground during a demonstration. Keith Bedford / The Boston Globe

Federal officials have put a freeze on Boston’s new tactic of killing rats by using dry ice.

City workers began using the super-cold substance to exterminate rats earlier this year by packing it into rat burrow exits and letting it melt. Dry ice, which is frozen carbon dioxide, reverts to being a gas as it melts, filling the burrows and suffocating any rats inside.

Read the complete story at BostonGlobe.com.

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