"The gas chambers were located inside the extermination area, in a
massive brick building. During the camp's first months of operation,
there were three gas chambers, each 4 x 4 meters and 2.6 meters high,
similar to the first gas chamber constructed in Sobibor. A room
attached to the building contained a diesel engine, which introduced
the poisonous carbon monoxide gas through pipes into the chambers, and
a generator, which supplied electricity to the entire camp.
The entrance doors to the gas chambers opened onto a wooden corridor
at the front of the building. Each of these doors was 1.8 meters high
and 90cm wide. The doors could be closed hermetically and locked from
the outside. Inside the gas chambers, opposite each entrance door, was
another door made of thick, strong wood beams, 2.5 meters wide and 1.8
meters high. These doors, too, were hermetically sealed. Inside the
chambers the walls were covered with white tiles up to a certain
height, and shower heads and piping crisscrossed the ceiling -- all
designed to maintain the illusion of a shower room. the piping
actually servied to carry the poison gas into the chambers. When the
doors were closed, there was no lighting in the chambers."
..
Unterscharfuhrer Erich Fuchs, who took part in the construction of
Treblinka, testified: "Subsequently I went to Treblinka. In this
extermination camp I installed a generator which supplied electric
light for the barracks. The work in Treblinka took me about three to
four busy months. During my stay there transports of Jews who were
gassed were coming in daily." <1>
"... The killings began on July 23, 1942... "
<1> Yad Vashem Archives, TR-10/1069, Band 9, page 1785, as quoted in
BELZEC, SOBIBOR, TREBLINKA - the Operation Reinhard Death Camps
Indiana University Press - Yitzhak Arad, 1987. ISBN 0-253-3429-7
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