Posted on 12/24/2009 11:09:10 AM PST by Winged Hussar
From Physicians for Civil Defense, "American Lives: Two for a Penny." The following is a wallet card that costs about half a cent, and the information it contains can mean the difference between life and death if Iran gives terrorists a nuclear weapon to detonate in an American city. Note that the cost to provide this card to every American ($1.5 million) is probably less than Barack Obama spent on his recent junket to Copenhagen. With regard to copyright, the accompanying letter says, "The enclosed yellow card offers a half-penny antidote: copy and disseminate."
Our knowledge of civil defense corroborates the above information, such as the 7/10 rule. In addition, it is extremely important to protect yourself from the heat from the weapon. Light-colored materials provide considerable protection, as shown by burn patterns on people from Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Dark clothing resulted in serious burns while light-colored portions of the same clothing covered minor burns or uninjured skin.
(Excerpt) Read more at israpundit.com ...
It’s not a lie. Nuclear detonations do not as a rule produce appreciable amounts of more than a limited number of elemental isotopes that are of direct concern in fallout. Iodine-131 and Strontium-90, while produced, are so uncommon that for humans to get appreciable amounts of either, they must land on plants, that are eaten by cows, who secrete more concentrated amounts in their milk.
Chernobyl did generate large amounts, producing isotopes of both iodine and cesium, both of which are very hazardous, in such quantity that people could uptake enough to do them harm.
So as far as risk assessment goes, if you can stay out of the fallout for two weeks, the hazard from fallout will be so low that you can pay attention to your more immediate problems, which can be just as deadly, after a nuclear detonation.
Some of the things we are talking about are lethal in the billionths of a gram range, like plutonium.
If you want to believe that because there is no dust, you are all safe and sound, that’s OK.
That’s one of the reasons I have bottled water and am not going to try to depend on water filters, at least for the first few weeks.
“Chernobyl did generate large amounts, producing isotopes of both iodine and cesium, both of which are very hazardous, in such quantity that people could uptake enough to do them harm.”
Chernobyl was a reactor meltdown and not a nuclear explosion; it was probably a lot dirtier than a nuke.
I can’t find any iodine for sale.
I thought it had been pulled from the market. I keep the Polar Pure stuff just for this reason.
Go to your local farm supply.
Nuclear, Biological, & Chemical Warfare- Survival Skills, Pt. II
Quoting from an article in the Boston Globe ...”the total number affected is thought to be more than one million”... (while I don't have any hard data, I am guessing that this is less than 10% of the total population that has lived in the area over the last 50+ years. I might also point out that in the case of the U.S. downwinders, while the overall cancer rate in the areas closest to the test site, they were statistically indistinguishable from cancers from smoking and other environmental causes. In addition, in the case of Kazakhstan, cancer was only a small part of a whole host of maladies brought on by the repeated nuclear testing) ...”health problems ranging from thyroid diseases, cancer, birth defects, deformities, premature aging, and cardiovascular diseases.”...
As bad as this sounds, consider the implications of the next sentence. “Life expectancy in the area is seven years less than the national average of Kazakhstan.” This population got nuked 106 times & yet, while a large number of the population is doomed to suffer with horrible, chronic illnesses, the scenario of masses of people dying of radiation exposure did not play out here.
Warning - Graphic pictures accompany article -
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/11/kazakhstans_radioactive_legacy.html
I might add that an EMP attack has a far greater potential of causing mass casualties. some projections are of up to 90% of U.S. citizens dead within a year of the attack. from the total loss of infrastructure. The one thing the Kazakhs had going for them was access to continuing medical care, even at the primitive level of the Soviet Union.
Oh well. Merry Christmas, everybody!.
“Plutonium is more dangerous when inhaled than when ingested. The risk of lung cancer increases once the total dose equivalent of inhaled radiation exceeds 400 mSv (40 rem). The U.S. Department of Energy estimates that the lifetime cancer risk for inhaling 5,000 plutonium particles, each about 3 microns wide, to be 1% over the background U.S. average. It is not absorbed into the body efficiently when ingested; only 0.04% of plutonium oxide is absorbed after ingestion.”
“Atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons, which ended in 1980, generated most environmental plutonium. About 10,000kg were released into the atmosphere during these tests. Average plutonium levels in surface soils from these tests range from .01 to .1 picocurie per gram. Accidents and production releases have caused greater local contamination.”
Yes indeed. However, the Russians have mastered the art of incredibly awful nuclear disasters. From dumping expired nuclear reactors and hundreds of curies of nuclear material in the Arctic Ocean, to Russia’s equivalent of Hanford dumping huge amounts of radioactive materials and toxic chemicals into the headwaters of a major river, “Russians make no mistakes but the very worst.”
But even by Russian standards, the Ural Mountain disaster leaves the others in the dust. It began as a reasonably good idea.
Store high grade nuclear waste in a stable, abandoned salt mine in the Ural Mountains. Punch vent holes in the rock, emplace monitoring equipment, then seal the door with a thick concrete plug.
At first, things went well. But then Kremlin bureaucrats decided that it was expensive to set up such a waste disposal site, so once it was at 100% capacity, they ordered that more waste would continue to be added. Finally, when it was overstuffed, the concrete plug was emplaced, but no vent holes or expensive monitoring equipment was done. Then they left.
It is now estimated that by the end of just one month, the internal temperature of the salt mine exceeded the temperature on the surface of the Sun. A US satellite traveling overhead pictured what looked like a nuclear weapon going off. It blew the top of the mountain off. We were perplexed.
Only years later, a physicist unrelated to the accident was driving through the area, when a roadside sign ordered that all vehicles were to close their windows until further notice. He then went from a lush, forested area, into a dead zone with no living things. The zone of death lasted for 40 miles. Then another sign advised that windows could now be opened.
Such devastation could only happen with the multitude of isotopes found in high grade nuclear waste. And it will remain that way for tens of thousands of years. The physicist was allowed to travel, and on one such opportunity, spilled the beans.
Only just before the Soviet Union fell did they confess to it, and several other horrific and terrible accidents, of which they had plenty.
The idiot lesson is "nuclear energy is bad."
The smart-person lesson is "Communism is bad."
Thanks for that one. I had not heard of the Ural incident; I am, however, familiar with some Soviet nuclear submarine incidents (all the result of poor construction and/or reactor system designs).
I just checked. (and got some more)
Rite-Aid has tincture of iodine, 3.99 for 2 fl ozs.
Thanks! Thanks good news
The bad news is - If we had a Rite-Aid in Alaska, I would buy some. We don’t. Walgreens?
Do they sell over the web?
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