How long does it take to cremate a human body?
It varies with the equipment used, but the cremation time for the equipment installed at Birkenau appears to have required an incineration time of about an hour per body. The entire cremation cycle took longer and each oven, or retort, could reduce three or four bodies per day under normal operating circumstances. Birkenau had a total of 46 ovens so the capacity would have been 184 bodies per day if all of the facilities were operating at once. This, however, was not the case. Crematories IV and V had 8 ovens each and operated for only a few months before they broke down and were mothballed in 1943. The other two at Birkenau, numbered II and III, contained a total of 30 retorts which would have put the normal daily capacity at 90 to 120 bodies per day which is the rate indicted for the camp by the death registries.
It varies with the equipment used, but the cremation time for the equipment installed at Birkenau appears to have required an incineration time of about an hour per body. The entire cremation cycle took longer and each oven, or retort, could reduce three or four bodies per day under normal operating circumstances. Birkenau had a total of 46 ovens so the capacity would have been 184 bodies per day if all of the facilities were operating at once. This, however, was not the case. Crematories four and five had 8 ovens each and operated for only a few months before they broke down and were mothballed in 1943. The other two at Birkenau, numbered two and three, contained a total of 30 retorts which would have put the normal daily capacity at 90 to 120 bodies per day which is the rate indicted for the camp by the death registries. In 1942, when the crematory facilities for Birkenau were planned by the SS, it was also planned that the camp be greatly expanded and the inmate population increased
It varies with the equipment used, but the cremation time for the equipment installed at Birkenau appears to have required an incineration time of about an hour per body. The entire cremation cycle took longer and each oven, or retort, could reduce three or four bodies per day under normal operating circumstances. Birkenau had a total of 46 ovens so the capacity would have been 184 bodies per day if all of the facilities were operating at once.
It varies with the equipment used, but the cremation time for the equipment installed at Birkenau appears to have required an incineration time of about an hour per body. The entire cremation cycle took longer and each oven, or retort, could reduce three or four bodies per day under normal operating circumstances. Birkenau had a total of 46 ovens so the capacity would have been 184 bodies per day if all of the facilities were operating at once. This, however, was not the case. Crematories four and five had 8 ovens each and operated for only a few months before they broke down and were mothballed in 1943. The other two at Birkenau, numbered two and three, contained a total of 30 retorts which would have put the normal daily capacity at 90 to 120 bodies per day which is the rate indicted for the camp by the death registries.
It varies with the equipment used, but the cremation time for the equipment installed at Birkenau appears to have required an incineration time of about an hour per body. The entire cremation cycle took longer and each oven, or retort, could reduce three or four bodies per day under normal operating circumstances. Birkenau had a total of 46 ovens so the capacity would have been 184 bodies per day if all of the facilities were operating at once. This, however, was not the case. Crematories IV and V had 8 ovens each and operated for only a few months before they broke down and were mothballed in 1943. The other two at Birkenau, numbered II and III, contained a total of 30 retorts which would have put the normal daily capacity at 90 to 120 bodies per day which is the rate indicted for the camp by the death registries.
