Threats of dirty bomb...

Joined
Mar 19, 2003
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978
Hey guys

Was watching Fox a couple minutes ago, and they were talking about a new attack similar to 9/11... :eek: Dirty bombs, across the country :(

How would one prepare for that? Wouldnt stored water be tainted :(
 
Scarry....

If it is stored inside something that is radioactivily sealed I would think it would be ok?

I'm glad I live in the country at the top of the watershed sometimes.
 
If the water is sealed it wont become contaminated. The dirty bomb is not a nuclear explosion but rather radio active material attached to the bomb. So the contamination would be in the form of particles that were airborn due to the blast.

The radiation will not contaminate water but the particles themselves would be a contaminate if it gets into the water. So the dirty bomb's contamination will be in the form of dust or particles that are radio active.

Neal
 
The real threat of this type of device isn't immediate, but delayed. The hazards will be ingesting small particles of dust that are airborne or settle, and the health threat will be longterm (cancer, etc) not immediate radiation sickness.

Water supplies are actually very safe.
 
Dirty bomb's risk area is fairly localized.

Your best defense is a radiation meter of some sort so you know when you are exposed. The KFM design is simple and adequate.

Phil
 
The main impact of a dirty bomb is political and economic. You can generally just leave an area that is contaminated. Subsequently you clean the area and decide what you can tolerate. I saw a great program (I think it was on PBS) that talked about the politial and economic fallout vs the actual health hazards.

Once fallout has spread and or been cleaned up the risks get down to comparable to living at a slightly higher altitude and getting exposed to more cosmic rays. The public and some of the environmental laws may insist on wasting 10's or 100's of billion dollars trying to make things "as good as new". Political issues may insist that we reclaim some building that would be cheaper to replace.

In one great example they considered some stolen medical probes. If those were optimally distributed as dust in a Washington subway we might never notice the increased cancer rate, but we might be compeled by public opinion, laws, and policy to spend billions on pointless cleanup. In Brazil their was a contamination incident and a city was mobbed with people wanting to be radiation tested. The primary thing to fear is fear itself. Fallout will not stalk you. A radiation meter and moving away from the problem works fine.
 
From what I've read and heard, I believe that Jeff Clark's comments are on track. The real risk is biological.
 
There are over 100 Nuclear warheads scattered across the bottom of the Atlantic, roughly 30 scattered across the bottom of the Pacific. Salt water is an incredible corrosive. Sooner or later, the salt water will eat at the casings, and there will be radiactive clouds and rivers in our Oceans.

Dirty bombs are a risk. Nuclear warheads in the oceans are a real danger.
 
Dont panic YET.

Not saying it isnt possible, but do you think Ossama really wants mecca/medena to be Nuked?

If your worried stock up on iodine pills, and a good fallout shelter constructed in situ if you are not allowed to evac.
 
Yawn,

Saddam is "insaine", Kim Il Young jr. is "Insaine", Son of (Bin) Laden is "insaine"

See a pattern here? All of your enemies are "insaine".

Their "instablity" or "rouge factor" is cause for removal by any means neccessary. :rolleyes:

These guys are evil little punks, no doubt. But they are not nearly as insaine as the Psy-Ops guys want you to beleive.

If The good ol' US of A was attacked in a nuclear fashion, No Arab capitol would be safe.

Were some "insaine" (but brave president?) individual nuke mecca and medena, the religion of Islam would be delt a blow that would possibly destroy the religion, or at least set them back 100 years.

Bin laden wants to inherit the throne of "Saudia Arabia" he too is a royal prince and would not want to inherit a wasteland.
 
Who said anything about insanity?

If you are trying to convince me that I am wrong about Bin Laden, then I remain unconvinced. I think he would be perfectly happy to use any weapon of mass destruction he could get control of, regardless of the consequences.

Scott
 
No you did not say "insaine."

But working on the MAD principle bin laden would have to be either stupid or crazy to do this. more likely is a Biological agent that would/could be confused with a "natural" event like WNV, or SARS.

IMHO that is the underlying priciple. Just keep it in mind when watching your "programing", Lenno, SNL, fox "news" etc.
Plus we have known Al-Qiada has had these materials for YEARS (2-3)...so why now whip it up?


BTW with Iodine tabs, you must take them days in advance to flood the system so you wont absorb the radiologicaly fisionable potasium iodine.

P.S. More likely is an ACCIDENT like 3 mi.island. US cooling towers have KNOWN FAULTS...called "Scale build up" brought to you by westinghouse.:eek:

Look up the "scale" problem, and the bundles of free info. on the net for building a fallout/nuke shelter. Esp. if you have a basement, you have 1/2 the shelter right there.
 
Tzvi,

Hey, don't even get me started on fission reactors! Those things are nasty and too touchy!

I would *almost* prefer something ordinary like coal or gas, except that I am lucky enough to live in the northwest US, where we have a lot of zero-polution hydropower.

It would be really nice if someone would crack the problem of nuclear fusion energy -- nowhere near the risks.

You bring up a good point about reactors though. What if one were attacked?

Three Mile Island's plant came within something like 50 degrees C of an unstoppable meltdown, if memory serves. Chernobyl went completely, and look at the devastation there:

http://www.uic.com.au/nip22.htm

Regardless of the efficacy of a small "dirty bomb" and the probability of accidents, destroying or critically wounding a fission reactor would certainly have devastating effects.

Scott
 
No kidding Amigo,

the acident was bad, the Soviet style cover-up was worse. My brother's wife's uncle (okay no "spaceball" jokes)was Recriation biking in the area.
He's been sick from the initial radiation, and fighting a brain tumor for 3 years now, had surgery once, it came back.

Now he's getting massive doses of Chemo.

Thats the ultimate irony. More radiation....
The actual #'s of dead from Chernobyl will never be tabulated due to delayed reactions like his.

Any body here think that if some bad really hapned that you would be informed right away, or would FEMA want to "organize" an orderly evacuation?

:barf:
 
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