I was talking with someone about nuclear preparedness. He was fine with the general subject of preparedness, but balked on nuclear disaster preparedness. His reasons were something like," he would rather just die right away by not making any nuclear disaster preparations". That was instead of dying a slow death by radiation.
There are other options besides a lingering death by radiation or getting a bigger dose and dying faster.
This is not a new reaction to me, even if it is not as common among preppers. (Preppers are people who are ready for disasters.)
I live too close to a military base that is very likely to become ground zero in a nuclear shooting match. I am so close that it makes me essentially ground zero as well. A slow lingering death from radiation is not an option for me at this time. I would be pretty much instantly incinerated.
That does not mean that I want to ignore the realities of nuclear disasters.
The whole world was treated to a front row seat, courtesy of international media, when Japan had their run-in with atomic energy. No war has to cause exposure to a nuclear disaster.
Even when it comes to dealing with a war-based nuclear disaster, I do not choose to opt out of the discussion.
Human beings have been faced with "ultimate weapons", throughout our history. The long bow was regarded as such a terrible weapon that it surely would end wars. We can easily laugh at that idea now, but it was very serious at the time.
It is likely that some day people could have the same reaction to the idea of nuclear weapons being an ultimate weapon. The people at the time of the advent of the long bow, had no clue that some day nuclear weapons would, by comparison, make their fears humorous. The same could be true for ourselves and our own fears. This is no reason to dismiss nuclear war as a threat now. It is not a reason to think that nobody would ever dare to use such a horrible weapon.
No matter how horrible the weapon, humans have always used the ultimate weapon.
Nuclear weaponry is not likely to be an exception.
Russia and China take the idea of a nuclear war as inevitable. Both countries are matter-of-fact in building shelters to house citizens in the event of a nuclear war.
The USA has no comparable program for the general populace. There is, however, an extensive program to build shelters for "important" people, at taxpayer expense.
It beats me why the citizens of the USA tolerate this situation and how most US citizens blithely ignore the reality of war- based nuclear disasters.
I do think the average citizen anywhere in the world should accept the reality of nuclear war happening in the near future and prepare themselves for it. The people of the USA, being citizens of a prominently nuclear-weaponized-country, have more reason for this than the average citizen of most other countries.
If you live in the USA, it behooves you to prepare for nuclear war, if you are preparing for any kind of disaster. I have the links here on this blog, including an entire book on how to build a nuclear shelter. Please use it, or get the information elsewhere. I don't think "important" people who push buttons to start nuclear wars should be the only ones to survive the nuclear wars.
Showing posts with label nuclear disaster preparedness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nuclear disaster preparedness. Show all posts
Friday, April 12, 2013
Friday, February 1, 2013
What Is The Doomsday Clock?
The Doomsday Clock sounds pretty ominous. That means it has a good name for its purpose. It was created by scientists who helped make the first atomic bombs. They wanted to make people pay attention to the new dangers that the world faced at that time. Since then other serious dangers have been added to the Doomsday Clock, like climate change.
The people who run the Doomday Clock have a bulletin about it called, "The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists". Here is what they say the Doomsday Clock is for: "The Doomsday Clock conveys how close humanity is to catastrophic destruction--the figurative midnight--and monitors the means humankind could use to obliterate itself. First and foremost, these include nuclear weapons, but they also encompass climate-changing technologies and new developments in the life sciences that could inflict irrevocable harm."
They change the time on the Doomday Clock according to how close to "Midnight", or the destruction of the human race they think we are. Right now they have it set at five minutes to midnight.
They just moved it a minute closer to midnight recently because of the way world nuclear powers are not working very hard on nuclear disarmament. Most people not doing anything much about climate change is not helping move the hands on the Doomday Clock further away from midnight either.
The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists has moved the hands on the Doomsday Clock as close as two minutes to midnight. I believe they should have had them at least that close last summer. I posted about that.
We will have the same problem this summer, except probably worse. I intend to email and maybe write and do other kinds of contact attempts to ask them why they didn't move the hands closer last summer and if they are going to do the same this summer.
Russia's leaders have said they think that WWIII will start over the oil, gas and minerals in the Arctic. Russia planted their flag on the ocean floor under the North Pole in the Arctic. They also filed for ownership of the North Pole with the United Nations.
Last summer the US sent a Shell Oil Ship to begin drilling in the Arctic. They plan to put an oil rig there along with others. They plan to drill in the part of the Arctic that is offshore from Alaska, part of the United States.
However, the Shell Oil ship and others that will join it will be fracking. This means they plan to run pipelines sideways out further from the Alaskan coast.
I believe Russia could regard this sideways drilling as a provocative act and as aggression against their property claims.
In case you don't already know, George Bush announced during his presidential term that he was unilaterally ending the nuclear disarmament treaty with Russia. He said that the US will make more nukes instead of taking apart some of the ones we already have.
The Russians said, at first, that they would continue with their nuclear disarmament in spite of the USA breaking the treaty. After a while news stories made it look as if they thought better of taking apart their nukes while the USA was making more nukes again.
President Obama has not said anything to show that he intends to reinstate nuclear disarmament on the US end of the defunct treaty with Russia. He is talking about treaties, however. As you can tell from the Washington Post article, nuclear disarmament on the part of the USA is not necessarily a popular idea.
Since news stories have shown that Russia and China have gotten cozy with each other as allies lately and China has rapidly increased their supply of nukes, it looks like we have a more serious nuclear problem than has been acknowledged.
I am experiencing some bad computer difficulties, so have not placed links and quotes next to relevant comments, as I usually do. I am going to put them all here at the end of this post. I hope to have the computer issues resolved by posting time on Monday, February 4th.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/06/AR2007080601369.html
Here is a quote from the Washington post article from 2007: "TORONTO, Aug. 6 -- A dramatic submarine dive to plant the Russian flag on the seabed at the North Pole last week has rattled Canadian politics and underscored the growing stakes as the ice cap melts in the oil-rich Arctic."
Here is a link to an article about how many nuclear weapons China has. The estimates range from several hundred to over 3,000. The article says that the USA is losing in the nuclear weapons as deterrence because the infrastructure and personnel required to maintain, replace, and update them are shaky. Other things I have read do not agree with this, and estimate the USA as having over 5,000 nuclear weapons. Theoretically this number of nuclear weapons would be enough to kill over half of the population of Russia, if they were not protected by adequate shelters. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/sep/28/china-builds-nuclear-arsenal-while-rest-of-the-wor/
The estimates I have read on the number of Russian nuclear weapons is 70,000 to 80,000. I think this must be inflated because during the Russian change of government, soldiers were not paid and military infrastructure was not maintained. Russia has had enough prosperity since to work on that problem.
My apologies for not giving you as many links as usual for this post. If your computer is working, they are easy to find, however. Pick your favorite search engine and go for it if you are interested in finding out more about this.
The people who run the Doomday Clock have a bulletin about it called, "The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists". Here is what they say the Doomsday Clock is for: "The Doomsday Clock conveys how close humanity is to catastrophic destruction--the figurative midnight--and monitors the means humankind could use to obliterate itself. First and foremost, these include nuclear weapons, but they also encompass climate-changing technologies and new developments in the life sciences that could inflict irrevocable harm."
They change the time on the Doomday Clock according to how close to "Midnight", or the destruction of the human race they think we are. Right now they have it set at five minutes to midnight.
They just moved it a minute closer to midnight recently because of the way world nuclear powers are not working very hard on nuclear disarmament. Most people not doing anything much about climate change is not helping move the hands on the Doomday Clock further away from midnight either.
The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists has moved the hands on the Doomsday Clock as close as two minutes to midnight. I believe they should have had them at least that close last summer. I posted about that.
We will have the same problem this summer, except probably worse. I intend to email and maybe write and do other kinds of contact attempts to ask them why they didn't move the hands closer last summer and if they are going to do the same this summer.
Russia's leaders have said they think that WWIII will start over the oil, gas and minerals in the Arctic. Russia planted their flag on the ocean floor under the North Pole in the Arctic. They also filed for ownership of the North Pole with the United Nations.
Last summer the US sent a Shell Oil Ship to begin drilling in the Arctic. They plan to put an oil rig there along with others. They plan to drill in the part of the Arctic that is offshore from Alaska, part of the United States.
However, the Shell Oil ship and others that will join it will be fracking. This means they plan to run pipelines sideways out further from the Alaskan coast.
I believe Russia could regard this sideways drilling as a provocative act and as aggression against their property claims.
In case you don't already know, George Bush announced during his presidential term that he was unilaterally ending the nuclear disarmament treaty with Russia. He said that the US will make more nukes instead of taking apart some of the ones we already have.
The Russians said, at first, that they would continue with their nuclear disarmament in spite of the USA breaking the treaty. After a while news stories made it look as if they thought better of taking apart their nukes while the USA was making more nukes again.
President Obama has not said anything to show that he intends to reinstate nuclear disarmament on the US end of the defunct treaty with Russia. He is talking about treaties, however. As you can tell from the Washington Post article, nuclear disarmament on the part of the USA is not necessarily a popular idea.
Since news stories have shown that Russia and China have gotten cozy with each other as allies lately and China has rapidly increased their supply of nukes, it looks like we have a more serious nuclear problem than has been acknowledged.
I am experiencing some bad computer difficulties, so have not placed links and quotes next to relevant comments, as I usually do. I am going to put them all here at the end of this post. I hope to have the computer issues resolved by posting time on Monday, February 4th.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/06/AR2007080601369.html
Here is a quote from the Washington post article from 2007: "TORONTO, Aug. 6 -- A dramatic submarine dive to plant the Russian flag on the seabed at the North Pole last week has rattled Canadian politics and underscored the growing stakes as the ice cap melts in the oil-rich Arctic."
Here is a link to an article about how many nuclear weapons China has. The estimates range from several hundred to over 3,000. The article says that the USA is losing in the nuclear weapons as deterrence because the infrastructure and personnel required to maintain, replace, and update them are shaky. Other things I have read do not agree with this, and estimate the USA as having over 5,000 nuclear weapons. Theoretically this number of nuclear weapons would be enough to kill over half of the population of Russia, if they were not protected by adequate shelters. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/sep/28/china-builds-nuclear-arsenal-while-rest-of-the-wor/
The estimates I have read on the number of Russian nuclear weapons is 70,000 to 80,000. I think this must be inflated because during the Russian change of government, soldiers were not paid and military infrastructure was not maintained. Russia has had enough prosperity since to work on that problem.
My apologies for not giving you as many links as usual for this post. If your computer is working, they are easy to find, however. Pick your favorite search engine and go for it if you are interested in finding out more about this.
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Are You Disposable?
I knew a man who used to be a disaster warden. He was in charge of the local fallout shelter. Part of his duties was to check on and maintain the supplies in that shelter. He took it very seriously.
Enthusiasm and even support for the program had waned and he was mostly on his own in his warden duties. He duly checked on his supplies regularly and replaced them when needed. He even did a lot of it out of his own pocket.
I doubt that any such faithful wardens are left at all now. I read something that said that when somebody checked some old shelters all the supplies had been looted or destroyed by neglect.
The old fallout shelters were a leftover from the "Cold War" when the US government and citizens were ever mindful of the dangers they faced from imminent nuclear war.
As a country, the United States is no longer doing anything realistic to help the average citizen to survive a nuclear war. The average American is not complaining about this or even paying much attention to it. I think that buying into this kind of thinking is not good.
An average American has just as much right to survive a nuclear war as the President of the United States. I do not think we should allow our leaders to consider us expendable. We should not think of ourselves that way either.
Both Russia and China have plans to help their average citizens to survive a nuclear war. They continuously plan for what is needed to help all their citizens survive a nuclear war, or at least as many as possible. They take actions to carry out this plan.
The Russian approach is largely dependent on building subway systems in their large metro areas extra deep so that they can function as nuclear shelters in addition to their regular purpose.
http://www.december212012.com/articles/news/Russians_Shelters_2012.htm
This is a relatively simple and practical approach to sheltering a very large population. It is one that the USA does not even consider doing.
http://www.pakalertpress.com/2011/06/29/why-is-russia-building-5000-more-nuclear-bomb-shelters-in-moscow-by-the-end-of-2012/
Enthusiasm and even support for the program had waned and he was mostly on his own in his warden duties. He duly checked on his supplies regularly and replaced them when needed. He even did a lot of it out of his own pocket.
I doubt that any such faithful wardens are left at all now. I read something that said that when somebody checked some old shelters all the supplies had been looted or destroyed by neglect.
The old fallout shelters were a leftover from the "Cold War" when the US government and citizens were ever mindful of the dangers they faced from imminent nuclear war.
As a country, the United States is no longer doing anything realistic to help the average citizen to survive a nuclear war. The average American is not complaining about this or even paying much attention to it. I think that buying into this kind of thinking is not good.
An average American has just as much right to survive a nuclear war as the President of the United States. I do not think we should allow our leaders to consider us expendable. We should not think of ourselves that way either.
Both Russia and China have plans to help their average citizens to survive a nuclear war. They continuously plan for what is needed to help all their citizens survive a nuclear war, or at least as many as possible. They take actions to carry out this plan.
The Russian approach is largely dependent on building subway systems in their large metro areas extra deep so that they can function as nuclear shelters in addition to their regular purpose.
http://www.december212012.com/articles/news/Russians_Shelters_2012.htm
This is a relatively simple and practical approach to sheltering a very large population. It is one that the USA does not even consider doing.
http://www.pakalertpress.com/2011/06/29/why-is-russia-building-5000-more-nuclear-bomb-shelters-in-moscow-by-the-end-of-2012/
All of this is not so bad if US leaders are acting as if they are prepared to take their chances with the rest of us, but they are not. There are elaborate shelters built in the US only for our leaders. It does not matter which party is in power. Our leaders only build shelters for themselves.
It is not a good thing when a supposed Democratic government considers average citizens to be expendable. They can say whatever they want, but nothing speaks as clearly as actions. Those shelters only for our leaders and none for the rest of us speaks louder than words.
Monday, December 3, 2012
Nuclear Energy Debate Pros And Cons
If you read my blog much you already know that I am not a big fan of nukes, either bombs or nuclear energy. I grew up right next to where they started up a nuclear power plant. I attended the last biology class that had a field trip near the nuclear power plant before they fired up the plant.
The area had a lot of sea life that was unique in all the world. Much of it was only found within a few miles of the nuclear plant. All of the rare sea life is gone now.
Recently I spoke to a man who had a lot of scientific education and who had used some of this in his work careers. He insisted that nuclear power is now safe and that it is the salvation of the human race from the effects of climate change.
I know a lot more about science than the average person, but that isn't necessarily saying much. :-) I am not exactly a rocket scientist. It is possible for me to understand concepts of nuclear physics if the math is left out, however. The nuke fan man razzle dazzled me with physics talk and rattled my convictions that nukes are bad for the survival of the human race. That encouraged me to check out what he had to say.
I have already given my readers links to TED talks. This is an organization of people who wish to collaborate to help out the progress of the human race by various means. It is just mind candy if you like to learn good new stuff. They tend to stay right out there on the cutting edge of things, too.
Since I first began looking at TED talks, that is where I like to begin learning about things that are new to me or harder for me to understand. That includes physics. Naturally, that is where I went to find out whether nuke fan man was BSing me or not. I don't just take the TED talks as gospel, but they can be a good place to start.
They have this nifty debate that is about the pros and cons of nuclear energy. I found it especially edifying and I expect readers will as well.
Here is the link to this debate:
http://www.ted.com/talks/debate_does_the_world_need_nuclear_energy.html
The guy in the debate who is against nuclear energy is the director of a facility in the UK that does research on nuclear fusion. That is entirely different than the nuclear energy that we are used to.
Nuclear fusion is still a dream for the future. It is the exact opposite process than the nuclear energy that we are used to. Instead of getting energy from breaking apart atoms like current nuclear power plants, or fission, fusion puts atoms together to get nuclear power.
Nuclear fission, the nuclear power we use now, is very dirty. It makes lots of radioactive waste that can kill people for thousands of years after it makes power for a few years.
Nuclear fusion is not dirty and does not make a lot of waste. The problem with fusion is that people do not know how to do it yet. They don't think we will know enough about it to use it until 2030.
If you watched the debate video, you will notice that the audience was not in agreement about the results. There were a lot more people who changed their minds against nuclear energy after the debate. I believe that means the against side won because of better arguments.
Knowing the guy who was against nuclear power is a rocket scientist, who is working on fusion power, is an extra plus in my mind for the side against nuclear power. I still dislike nuclear power (fission) and think it is harmful to all of us.
The area had a lot of sea life that was unique in all the world. Much of it was only found within a few miles of the nuclear plant. All of the rare sea life is gone now.
Recently I spoke to a man who had a lot of scientific education and who had used some of this in his work careers. He insisted that nuclear power is now safe and that it is the salvation of the human race from the effects of climate change.
I know a lot more about science than the average person, but that isn't necessarily saying much. :-) I am not exactly a rocket scientist. It is possible for me to understand concepts of nuclear physics if the math is left out, however. The nuke fan man razzle dazzled me with physics talk and rattled my convictions that nukes are bad for the survival of the human race. That encouraged me to check out what he had to say.
I have already given my readers links to TED talks. This is an organization of people who wish to collaborate to help out the progress of the human race by various means. It is just mind candy if you like to learn good new stuff. They tend to stay right out there on the cutting edge of things, too.
Since I first began looking at TED talks, that is where I like to begin learning about things that are new to me or harder for me to understand. That includes physics. Naturally, that is where I went to find out whether nuke fan man was BSing me or not. I don't just take the TED talks as gospel, but they can be a good place to start.
They have this nifty debate that is about the pros and cons of nuclear energy. I found it especially edifying and I expect readers will as well.
Here is the link to this debate:
http://www.ted.com/talks/debate_does_the_world_need_nuclear_energy.html
The guy in the debate who is against nuclear energy is the director of a facility in the UK that does research on nuclear fusion. That is entirely different than the nuclear energy that we are used to.
Nuclear fusion is still a dream for the future. It is the exact opposite process than the nuclear energy that we are used to. Instead of getting energy from breaking apart atoms like current nuclear power plants, or fission, fusion puts atoms together to get nuclear power.
Nuclear fission, the nuclear power we use now, is very dirty. It makes lots of radioactive waste that can kill people for thousands of years after it makes power for a few years.
Nuclear fusion is not dirty and does not make a lot of waste. The problem with fusion is that people do not know how to do it yet. They don't think we will know enough about it to use it until 2030.
If you watched the debate video, you will notice that the audience was not in agreement about the results. There were a lot more people who changed their minds against nuclear energy after the debate. I believe that means the against side won because of better arguments.
Knowing the guy who was against nuclear power is a rocket scientist, who is working on fusion power, is an extra plus in my mind for the side against nuclear power. I still dislike nuclear power (fission) and think it is harmful to all of us.
Friday, August 3, 2012
A Crisis Point For The Human Race
The choices we make now can make the difference between whether we live or whether we die. If we continue what we are doing, we may destroy ourselves. We, the human race, are at a crisis point in our development.
We must make the right choices now. I want this post to help people to make the right choices.
Some people say that the human race has entered the "electronic age". I included a timeline in this post to give you ways of looking at where we are now. You will notice that the "electronic age" is not very long.
This particular timeline places the beginning of the electronic age at about the year 2000. Since we are at only the year 2012 now, that means the electronic age has lasted 12 years so far.
The human race has caused great harm to the earth in a short time. We began "global warming" along with our industrial age.
Climate change really accelerated since we began using more fossil fuels. We can say it started with the "scientific revolution" shown on this timeline in 1600.
Notice that big changes in human history are occurring more frequently as time passes.
I believe that we reach time "nodes" where a great change may or may not take place. I believe that we have reached a change node now.
We are very dependent on types of fuel that we are running out of, for the way we live. We do not have good replacements for these types of fuel.
We are very close to fighting over increasingly scarce fuels. Weapons that we will use in WWIII don't give us much chance that our civilization will survive the war. It is even likely that we can all die.
I posted about some of the weapons being made, or already made, in addition to nuclear weapons. They are installations like HAARP, and black holes. Other chemical and biological weapons could be just as destructive to all of us.
We have to make the right choice at this change node. I have already posted my belief that spiritual development is a preparedness skill. It is even more important than that. Our spiritual skills are the reason for this change node.
It is time for a spiritual age to begin. This spiritual age can be made by practical, real world uses for spiritual gifts.
We need these practical uses for spiritual gifts now. We need them to make it past the threat of World War III. This war will be a confrontation over scarce fuels and other resources. It will be over the damage we have caused by using these fuels and resources.
We can use our spiritual gifts to replace scarce fuels to keep our way of life. We don't need to fight over our remaining fuels. We can repair the damage to the environment using our spiritual gifts.
We can enjoy a better way of life than we have now and allow others to enjoy the same. With the use of our spiritual gifts, there is enough to go around.
Development and use of your spiritual gifts is a source of enormous power for you and for the human race as a whole. We need this now. You need this now.
I want you to discover, develop and use your spiritual gifts. I hope you will help to begin the next age, the spiritual age.
We must make the right choices now. I want this post to help people to make the right choices.
Some people say that the human race has entered the "electronic age". I included a timeline in this post to give you ways of looking at where we are now. You will notice that the "electronic age" is not very long.
This particular timeline places the beginning of the electronic age at about the year 2000. Since we are at only the year 2012 now, that means the electronic age has lasted 12 years so far.
The human race has caused great harm to the earth in a short time. We began "global warming" along with our industrial age.
Climate change really accelerated since we began using more fossil fuels. We can say it started with the "scientific revolution" shown on this timeline in 1600.
Notice that big changes in human history are occurring more frequently as time passes.
I believe that we reach time "nodes" where a great change may or may not take place. I believe that we have reached a change node now.
We are very dependent on types of fuel that we are running out of, for the way we live. We do not have good replacements for these types of fuel.
We are very close to fighting over increasingly scarce fuels. Weapons that we will use in WWIII don't give us much chance that our civilization will survive the war. It is even likely that we can all die.
I posted about some of the weapons being made, or already made, in addition to nuclear weapons. They are installations like HAARP, and black holes. Other chemical and biological weapons could be just as destructive to all of us.
We have to make the right choice at this change node. I have already posted my belief that spiritual development is a preparedness skill. It is even more important than that. Our spiritual skills are the reason for this change node.
It is time for a spiritual age to begin. This spiritual age can be made by practical, real world uses for spiritual gifts.
We need these practical uses for spiritual gifts now. We need them to make it past the threat of World War III. This war will be a confrontation over scarce fuels and other resources. It will be over the damage we have caused by using these fuels and resources.
We can use our spiritual gifts to replace scarce fuels to keep our way of life. We don't need to fight over our remaining fuels. We can repair the damage to the environment using our spiritual gifts.
We can enjoy a better way of life than we have now and allow others to enjoy the same. With the use of our spiritual gifts, there is enough to go around.
Development and use of your spiritual gifts is a source of enormous power for you and for the human race as a whole. We need this now. You need this now.
I want you to discover, develop and use your spiritual gifts. I hope you will help to begin the next age, the spiritual age.
Saturday, July 28, 2012
Putting Your Money Where Your Mouth Is
Some Americans have a saying, "Put your money where your mouth is." Sometimes they also say, "Put up or shut up." Both have to do with gambling originally, but have come to mean something about life.
The current idea as it relates to life is, "Don't give me empty words. Show what you are saying in your actions or your behavior."
Most people do not have a good match between their ideas and what they say is right, and what they do.
I know that I have this problem in my own life. Lately I have been trying to fix it. I wish for my entire way of life to reflect what I think and believe.
I don't feel the urge to renounce the world and hie me to a nunnery or don a yellow robe and take up a begging bowl, at this point, however.
India and China are joining the ranks of Westerners already enjoying an affluence unprecedented in human history. More people have a higher standard of living than ever before.
More people are living wastefully as well. An artist is making beautiful photographs of some of this waste that we do. An article about his work mentioned how much is wasted on a regular basis, and how much it costs.
I am very good at stretching my money, but even so, I am guilty of waste. I have been trying to change this.
Stopping waste is good for many reasons. Some of the reasons are really important ones. If we waste food, for example, it is not simply a piece of celery that we waste. It is also the fuel it took to water it, pick it and ship it.
We are too close to WWIII over fuel. It is easy to feel helpless over this and give up trying to do anything. Most of us feel pretty insignificant. How can it matter what one insignificant person does?
Millions of insignificant people all acting together on anything can change the entire world. Perhaps it is time we made ourselves significant.
We don't want to end our lives in a nuclear holocaust. Our lives can reflect that. One easy way for that to happen is to stop our waste. We can all put our money where our mouths are.
The current idea as it relates to life is, "Don't give me empty words. Show what you are saying in your actions or your behavior."
Most people do not have a good match between their ideas and what they say is right, and what they do.
I know that I have this problem in my own life. Lately I have been trying to fix it. I wish for my entire way of life to reflect what I think and believe.
I don't feel the urge to renounce the world and hie me to a nunnery or don a yellow robe and take up a begging bowl, at this point, however.
India and China are joining the ranks of Westerners already enjoying an affluence unprecedented in human history. More people have a higher standard of living than ever before.
More people are living wastefully as well. An artist is making beautiful photographs of some of this waste that we do. An article about his work mentioned how much is wasted on a regular basis, and how much it costs.
I am very good at stretching my money, but even so, I am guilty of waste. I have been trying to change this.
Stopping waste is good for many reasons. Some of the reasons are really important ones. If we waste food, for example, it is not simply a piece of celery that we waste. It is also the fuel it took to water it, pick it and ship it.
We are too close to WWIII over fuel. It is easy to feel helpless over this and give up trying to do anything. Most of us feel pretty insignificant. How can it matter what one insignificant person does?
Millions of insignificant people all acting together on anything can change the entire world. Perhaps it is time we made ourselves significant.
We don't want to end our lives in a nuclear holocaust. Our lives can reflect that. One easy way for that to happen is to stop our waste. We can all put our money where our mouths are.
Monday, July 2, 2012
Why Nukes Affect Everyone In The World Even If Your Country Has None
I am over my hissy fit because of so many people not doing what they need to take care of themselves. I will just keep doing what I can to help with this blog and my neighborhood emergency watch leader thing, etc. I have not made cards with my blog address on it so I can pass them out and help a few more people survive what is coming. I will do that soon.
I have been especially distressed because there are a lot of things going on that say WWIII could start any time. A nuclear shooting war is going to be difficult to survive. I would not make it at this point and was hoping that if I pass on what I know, others who have the resources to do it will be able to survive.
The idea of only a few greedy, self-centered Bilderbergs living through a nuclear holocaust that they are trying to cause, bothers me a lot. I would like for some good, ordinary people to survive as well.
The Bilderbergs have admitted that they think others are just "eaters", or people who are not worth the food they consume. They think cattle have more value than people.
I disagree with that idea. Therefore,
I have posts on nuclear survival. Those posts have links to entire free books on how to build a shelter that will protect you from nuclear fallout radiation.
There are other posts on making your own Faraday cage to protect your electronics from the EMP (ElectroMagnetic Pulse) that comes with nuclear weapons. The HAARPs can probably generate EMPs as well.
If you have been reading my other posts, you already know that the sun has been doing massive sunspots, or coronal mass ejections. These coronal mass ejections also generate EMPs. One of them wiped out the electrical grid in part of Canada.
All of the EMP stuff means you had better keep a radio in a Faraday cage to make sure you know what to do in case there is a nuclear strike near you. I already did a post on how to make your own Faraday cage.
It will be a big advantage to know how many nukes hit near you, how far away they are, and what size the nuclear payload is. All of this information will help you know how long to stay inside your shelter.
I have not posted much about China as a nuclear power because I didn't know that much. China has been rapidly increasing the size of their nuclear stockpile. They have admitted to a much smaller nuclear stockpile than they actually have. I read that estimates of the actual number of nukes that China has, are from 3000 to 5000 instead of the 400 they admit to.
The number of nuclear weapons that China has is important to everyone in the world. Radiation does not respect borders, even if the nukes are not aimed at your area.
I have been especially distressed because there are a lot of things going on that say WWIII could start any time. A nuclear shooting war is going to be difficult to survive. I would not make it at this point and was hoping that if I pass on what I know, others who have the resources to do it will be able to survive.
The idea of only a few greedy, self-centered Bilderbergs living through a nuclear holocaust that they are trying to cause, bothers me a lot. I would like for some good, ordinary people to survive as well.
The Bilderbergs have admitted that they think others are just "eaters", or people who are not worth the food they consume. They think cattle have more value than people.
I disagree with that idea. Therefore,
I have posts on nuclear survival. Those posts have links to entire free books on how to build a shelter that will protect you from nuclear fallout radiation.
There are other posts on making your own Faraday cage to protect your electronics from the EMP (ElectroMagnetic Pulse) that comes with nuclear weapons. The HAARPs can probably generate EMPs as well.
If you have been reading my other posts, you already know that the sun has been doing massive sunspots, or coronal mass ejections. These coronal mass ejections also generate EMPs. One of them wiped out the electrical grid in part of Canada.
All of the EMP stuff means you had better keep a radio in a Faraday cage to make sure you know what to do in case there is a nuclear strike near you. I already did a post on how to make your own Faraday cage.
It will be a big advantage to know how many nukes hit near you, how far away they are, and what size the nuclear payload is. All of this information will help you know how long to stay inside your shelter.
I have not posted much about China as a nuclear power because I didn't know that much. China has been rapidly increasing the size of their nuclear stockpile. They have admitted to a much smaller nuclear stockpile than they actually have. I read that estimates of the actual number of nukes that China has, are from 3000 to 5000 instead of the 400 they admit to.
The number of nuclear weapons that China has is important to everyone in the world. Radiation does not respect borders, even if the nukes are not aimed at your area.
Friday, June 1, 2012
Cheap Faraday Cage Continued or More About Protecting Your Electronics From EMPs
This post is a continuation of how to make your own Faraday Cage to protect your electronic devices against EMPs. Electro Magnetic Pulses is the long way to say EMPs.
I posted on this yesterday and did other posts earlier to explain what EMPs are and why they are a problem. The short version of why they are a problem is they will destroy electronics from cell phones to cars and power plants.
I like the idea of using metal cans with metal lids stuffed with shredded paper around the electronic device inside it. It was suggested that one file the top of the inside of the metal can to make sure it is in firm contact with the metal top of the metal can. There is disagreement among experts as to how important this is.
If I am going to try to keep an electronic device safe from an EMP and some experts think filing the top of a metal can will work better, I'm filing.
It is suggested by some experts that a double layer of both metal and insulation is more effective protection.
A few experts said that none of the above will work unless the electronic device and its Faraday Cage, are under three feet or more, of dirt.
There is at least one company that sells envelopes of various sizes, that they say are effective Faraday Cages. They demonstrate this effectiveness by placing electronic devices inside microwave ovens, with and without their product surrounding the electronic device. They have videos on youtube to let you see this demonstration.
The company admits that nobody knows if protection from microwaves means protection from EMPs. The electronic devices do seem to be protected from microwaves by the company's products.
The envelopes are silver, metallic material that the company claims is not mylar and is superior to mylar for Faraday Cage sort of protection of electronics. The envelopes range in size from cell phone size up to very large computer or television size.
I am not certain that the above product will either work, or be worth the money, so I am not giving their name on here. You can do a search for it if you want to know more about them.
One of the major problems with using a Faraday Cage is that they will not work when you are using most things you want in Faraday Cages. You must have a spare electronic device to keep in the Faraday Cage to protect it, or take your chances when you are using it.
The reason a Faraday Cage will not work when you are using it is mostly because an EMP can travel along electrical lines from the outside. Even if you are underground, if you get electricity from above ground, the EMPs can still destroy your electronics. It will get wireless too. If it can get a signal it can pick up an EMP.
Apparently, even if you use a generator that is also underground, the grid in your underground shelter may act as a receiver and zap your electronics by an EMP. If you have plans along these lines, be sure to find a way to vent the generator so you don't asphyxiate yourself from the gases given off by it.
I plan to make my own Faraday Cage. I hope to build an underground home and keep it under three feet or more of dirt, eventually. Meanwhile, I am making a two layer Faraday Cage myself. At the moment it will only contain an emergency radio. The next occupant will probably be a spare cell phone.
Thursday, May 31, 2012
Cheap Way To Make Your Own Faraday Cage
EMPs were the subject of previous posts. They were mostly to explain what EMPs are and why they are a problem for you. I will repeat the basic information in this post as well for those who have not read the previous ones.
Electro Magnetic Pulses, or EMPs for short, are one of the side effects of nuclear bombs. They can also be caused by the sun when it does a large solar mass ejection. The latter has wiped out electrical grids in small areas of the earth.
Electronic devices are affected by EMPs. That includes such items as cell phones, televisions, microwaves and cars less than 30 years old. Most electrical grids are so dependent on electronics that areas affected by EMPs will lose their electricity.
Most experts seem to believe that it will take years to even get electricity going again in affected areas. Many experts think widespread EMPs will knock civilization back to the stone age permanently.
If you think the last is unlikely, remember that factories run on electricity and the power plants need electronics to make electricity.
Most people can not do much about general EMP problems. We can, however, do things to protect some of our own most important electronic devices. A Faraday Cage is the way for us normal people to do this. There are some very fancy versions of Faraday Cages. I am going to tell you how to make a simple Faraday Cage.
I can not guarantee you that the Faraday Cage I will tell you about will work. That is partly because nobody really knows what will happen with a really bad, widespread occurrence of EMPs. I will give you the best simple information that I could find.
The basic idea of a Faraday Cage is to surround your electronic device that you want to protect, by both insulation and metal. The electronic device needs insulation from contact with the metal. The metal needs to completely surround the electronic device.
Shredded paper, styrofoam and cardboard are some of the types of insulation that I have seen mentioned. I do not like styrofoam myself because I used to rub balloons on it to make them stick to things and that builds up static electricity. Some of the fancy Faraday Cages have elaborate devices to prevent static electricity.
One of the simplest ways to make a Faraday Cage is to put your electronic device in a cardboard box and cover the outside of the box with aluminum foil. It seems to be fairly important to make sure there are no gaps in either the foil or the insulation.
This post is getting too long, so I will continue this post.
Electro Magnetic Pulses, or EMPs for short, are one of the side effects of nuclear bombs. They can also be caused by the sun when it does a large solar mass ejection. The latter has wiped out electrical grids in small areas of the earth.
Electronic devices are affected by EMPs. That includes such items as cell phones, televisions, microwaves and cars less than 30 years old. Most electrical grids are so dependent on electronics that areas affected by EMPs will lose their electricity.
Most experts seem to believe that it will take years to even get electricity going again in affected areas. Many experts think widespread EMPs will knock civilization back to the stone age permanently.
If you think the last is unlikely, remember that factories run on electricity and the power plants need electronics to make electricity.
Most people can not do much about general EMP problems. We can, however, do things to protect some of our own most important electronic devices. A Faraday Cage is the way for us normal people to do this. There are some very fancy versions of Faraday Cages. I am going to tell you how to make a simple Faraday Cage.
I can not guarantee you that the Faraday Cage I will tell you about will work. That is partly because nobody really knows what will happen with a really bad, widespread occurrence of EMPs. I will give you the best simple information that I could find.
The basic idea of a Faraday Cage is to surround your electronic device that you want to protect, by both insulation and metal. The electronic device needs insulation from contact with the metal. The metal needs to completely surround the electronic device.
Shredded paper, styrofoam and cardboard are some of the types of insulation that I have seen mentioned. I do not like styrofoam myself because I used to rub balloons on it to make them stick to things and that builds up static electricity. Some of the fancy Faraday Cages have elaborate devices to prevent static electricity.
One of the simplest ways to make a Faraday Cage is to put your electronic device in a cardboard box and cover the outside of the box with aluminum foil. It seems to be fairly important to make sure there are no gaps in either the foil or the insulation.
This post is getting too long, so I will continue this post.
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Your Chance To Save The World
I asked Ken Salazar, Secretary,U.S. Department of the Interior in a modified form letter to not start WWIII by drilling in the US Arctic. I am posting a copy of the form letter sent to me along with my changes. The original is plain print. My changes are in italics.
I hope you will tell Salazar not to start WWIII also.
Salazar's address is included at the bottom of the letter, if you want to use it. I plan to add other forms of contact information as well.
Here is my letter along with the original from the Center for Biological Diversity.
http://www.doi.gov/public/contact-us.cfm
Phone: (202) 208-3100
E-Mail: feedback@ios.doi.gov
Web: Feedback form
People and Bureaus:
I hope you will tell Salazar not to start WWIII also.
Salazar's address is included at the bottom of the letter, if you want to use it. I plan to add other forms of contact information as well.
Here is my letter along with the original from the Center for Biological Diversity.
"The Center for Biological Diversity and other environmental
groups have called on Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to say no to BP’s Liberty
project until proper environmental reviews can be completed. The decision about
whether to risk destroying the Arctic as BP has destroyed the Gulf is in
Secretary Salazar’s hands. Please tell the secretary not to let BP drill in the
Arctic.:
Subject: Don’t Let BP Oil the Arctic
Your Letter:
I request that you, as head of the Department of the
Interior, deny BP's application to drill for the Liberty production drilling
project, slated to begin this fall in the Alaskan Arctic." Pravda, the semi-official voice of Russian leadership, stated that they
believe that WWIII will begin over the rights to the North Pole and Arctic area.
I assume that the rush for drilling is occasioned by the Russians planting
their flag on the Arctic sea floor and filing for possession with the UN and
the Canadians superior claims to the area, due to having residents in the area,
unlike anyone else.
Having BRITISH
Petroleum drilling in the US Arctic area seems like a questionable plan,
considering that Canadians are part of the UK Commonwealth. Even worse is
getting the US into a shooting war with nuclear weapons over drilling in a
pristine wildlife refuge, without letting the US people in on the matter. If
you bear a large part of the responsibility for killing off most of the
populations of the USA, Russia, and who knows how many others, because of
getting us into a nuclear war, I wouldn't think there would be any hole you
could hide in on or off the planet to avoid the consequences. I do hope you will pause and reconsider.
I'm piggybacking my
two cents in with others who are mainly concerned for, and aware of the
environmental consequences of drilling, so far. I agree with them about those
aspects of this matter. It seems that getting us into a nuclear war kind of
supercedes the rest of it, however.
"The disaster in the Gulf of Mexico has called into question
BP's assurances about safety and response capability. Interior should therefore
reject BP's current Liberty drilling plan and defer any future consideration of
the project until the federal government has completed a full environmental
review that realistically takes into account BP's response capabilities in the
Arctic.
I further request that you defer any future approval until
and unless you can ensure that BP can devote adequate resources to any incident
that might occur in the Arctic.
BP has described its Arctic Liberty project as “one of its
biggest challenges to date.” If the project goes forward, Liberty's
ultra-extended reach wells will be the longest ever attempted. In order to
drill these unprecedented wells, BP had to commission the building of the
largest drilling rig in the world. Once drilled, BP's horizontal wells will be
more prone than traditional wells to gas kicks, which are the most common cause
of blowouts.
Despite the inherent dangers in experimenting with this
untested technology, the Interior Department's environmental review of the
Liberty project was lax at best. BP in fact wrote its own environmental
assessment of the impacts of the Liberty project. Not surprisingly, BP found
that there would be no significant impacts from the project and that the
possibility of an oil spill was low.
If anything, the Arctic is even more vulnerable to an oil
spill than the Gulf of Mexico. There is no technology for cleaning oil in
broken ice conditions. The sea-ice environment is extremely dynamic, and the
Arctic is subject to dangerous weather conditions, including high winds and
storms, that could seriously complicate any response to a spill. What's more,
there isn't the infrastructure or capacity to respond. The nearest Coast Guard
station is more than 1,000 miles away in Kodiak, and much of the oil spill
response equipment in the Arctic is more than 20 years old. Until BP makes an
affirmative showing, verified by the Department of the Interior, that it is
capable and ready to respond to a significant oil spill in the Arctic, the Liberty
project should not move forward.
The Interior Department has the legal right, as well as the
responsibility, to deny BP's application to drill at Liberty this year and
defer future approvals until it can guarantee there will not be a BP disaster
in the Arctic. Lax environmental review of BP's drilling plans led to the worst
environmental catastrophe in the history of this country. The Department of the
Interior must not allow BP to take its chances in the Arctic." I don’t believe the Department of Interior
should allow BP to take everyone else’s chances in the Arctic either. I think
we could muster a dual party majority of the US citizens who would agree that
we are not prepared to begin WWIII at this time.
"Your letter will be sent to the following recipient(s):
Ken Salazar, Secretary
U.S. Department of the Interior
1849 C Street, N.W.
Washington, DC 20240"
http://www.doi.gov/public/contact-us.cfm
Phone: (202) 208-3100
E-Mail: feedback@ios.doi.gov
Web: Feedback form
People and Bureaus:
- Employee Directory - available by phone (202) 208-3100
- National Park Service
- U.S. Fish and Wildlife
- Bureau of Indian Affairs
- Bureau of Land Management
- Office of Surface Mining
- Minerals Management Service
- U.S. Geological Survey
- Bureau of Reclamation
DOI Social Media
The Department of the Interior's primary social media outlets
YouTube: USInterior - short videos
- and your comments
Flickr: USInterior - feature photos
- from Interior news events
Twitter: @Interior - hashtag #usdoi
- hashtags #jobs #usdoi
Facebook: USInterior - Our
- Facebook page
- Secretary's Facebook page
Here is a link to the original page on the
Center for Biological Diversity's site:
Please pass this on as much as you are
willing and able to do. This could be
your chance to save the world.
Sunday, May 27, 2012
Apology And Hope About Nukes
This blog post is an apology to readers who thought they would have a good chance to live through a nuclear war. For those of us in countries that have nuclear weapons and potential enemies that also have nuclear weapons, our chances are not nearly as good as I thought.
The worst countries in this regard are the United States of America and Russia. I had been reading older materials about nuclear shelters, etc. Some of them were updated, but none of them gave numbers about our chances of living through the use of nuclear weapons. They all emphasized how survivable nuclear war is. They lied.
The USA has over 5,000 nuclear weapons. That amount of weapons is estimated to be enough to wipe out about 54% of the USSR (former) population according to some good sources. I have been trying to deal with this shock as well as the one about how many nukes Russia has. It is estimated to be 70,000 to 80,000.
If 5,000 or so nukes is enough to kill off over half of the Russian people, then about 10,000 should be enough to entirely eliminate the American people. But, hey! if that didn't do it, there are another 60,000 to 70,000 extras to finish up. That should account for launching dangerous war canoes from Hawaii or Guam or American Samoa.
Now if we build very good shelters we can stay alive as long as we stay in them, but with that many nukes carpeting the country, we would not have much left to come back out to and be safe out there.
Russia might be a little better off, but since the USA has backed off of the nuclear disarmament treaty, that probably won't last.
I have been posting about using the spiritual gifts that each of us has for the last few days. The main reason why I began talking about our spiritual gifts is because of our nuclear situation. I think our spiritual gifts are the way out of this life-threatening mess.
Our governments all over the world have gotten away from the people they are meant to serve. The governments are in charge, instead of the people, and are not good bosses. If we use our spiritual gifts our governments can not run over all of us the way they are doing now. That includes nuclear weapons. If enough of us develop and use our spiritual gifts, nuclear war would be impossible.
Most of the people in the world do not want to die in a nuclear disaster, either accidental, like a power plant or deliberate, like nuclear weapons used in a war. If we are using our spiritual gifts, we do not have to let our politicians play with nuclear bombs. They can't be trusted with them and we should not have to put up with our politicians having them and being able to use them against the will of the people.
I would like to see this happen. We need to find, develop, and use our spiritual gifts and have good lives, free from worry about a nuclear war that will kill us or make us wish we were dead.
The worst countries in this regard are the United States of America and Russia. I had been reading older materials about nuclear shelters, etc. Some of them were updated, but none of them gave numbers about our chances of living through the use of nuclear weapons. They all emphasized how survivable nuclear war is. They lied.
The USA has over 5,000 nuclear weapons. That amount of weapons is estimated to be enough to wipe out about 54% of the USSR (former) population according to some good sources. I have been trying to deal with this shock as well as the one about how many nukes Russia has. It is estimated to be 70,000 to 80,000.
If 5,000 or so nukes is enough to kill off over half of the Russian people, then about 10,000 should be enough to entirely eliminate the American people. But, hey! if that didn't do it, there are another 60,000 to 70,000 extras to finish up. That should account for launching dangerous war canoes from Hawaii or Guam or American Samoa.
Now if we build very good shelters we can stay alive as long as we stay in them, but with that many nukes carpeting the country, we would not have much left to come back out to and be safe out there.
Russia might be a little better off, but since the USA has backed off of the nuclear disarmament treaty, that probably won't last.
I have been posting about using the spiritual gifts that each of us has for the last few days. The main reason why I began talking about our spiritual gifts is because of our nuclear situation. I think our spiritual gifts are the way out of this life-threatening mess.
Our governments all over the world have gotten away from the people they are meant to serve. The governments are in charge, instead of the people, and are not good bosses. If we use our spiritual gifts our governments can not run over all of us the way they are doing now. That includes nuclear weapons. If enough of us develop and use our spiritual gifts, nuclear war would be impossible.
Most of the people in the world do not want to die in a nuclear disaster, either accidental, like a power plant or deliberate, like nuclear weapons used in a war. If we are using our spiritual gifts, we do not have to let our politicians play with nuclear bombs. They can't be trusted with them and we should not have to put up with our politicians having them and being able to use them against the will of the people.
I would like to see this happen. We need to find, develop, and use our spiritual gifts and have good lives, free from worry about a nuclear war that will kill us or make us wish we were dead.
Monday, April 30, 2012
Everyday People's Nuclear Disaster Risk Reduction
According to many authorities that I have read during my research for posts for this blog, I have found a lot that say that say that nuclear war is survivable if you prepare for it.
I have also read a lot that makes me wonder whether I would want to survive a nuclear disaster. This, of course, also makes me wonder whether other people would feel the same way.
Since disaster risk reduction is a very good idea to avoid deaths and damage or make them less, I think we need to do disaster risk reduction with nuclear war and with nuclear power use as well.
The simplest way to do this with nuclear war is not to have one. How we might achieve this goal is harder.
Russia and the USA have many more nuclear weapons than any other countries.
If we leave the decisions about these weapons to our politicians of these countries, we will end up nuking each other in the near future. I do not like this idea, nor do a lot of Americans. I believe the numbers of Americans who do not like this are the vast majority.
According to some statistics I have read, over half of Russians do not like this either.
I am not sure what is happening in Russia about this matter, but a lot of Americans are very discouraged about nuclear weapons to the point of being fatalistic about it. Many young Americans have a resigned attitude about it and think they will die before their time.
I think Americans and Russians as well as other nuclear weapons nations like China, France, the UK, India, Pakistan, Israel, Belgium, Germany, Netherlands, Italy, Turkey, and North Korea, should find a way to do disaster risk reduction with nuclear weapons.
I think I can help a little by giving people some information to use for thinking about nuclear disaster risk reduction. Not that many people read my blog now, but the number is going up fast. All I can do is try, so I will.
I do not think nuclear power is a great idea either, so I will provide information for those who agree on this or are willing to think about it.
Below I have included a map of nuclear power in countries of the world. It also includes countries that have nuclear power plants in the planning and building stages.
This is a file from the Wikimedia Commons.
The link below is a world map of uranium deposits.
http://www.wise-uranium.org/img/uresw.gif
I found it interesting that Canada has very large uranium deposits, yet does not use any nuclear power. They have a great abundance of hydroelectric power, and a small population, so they do not have a need for nuclear power.
New Zealand got into financial difficulty with paying for a nuclear power plant that did not do what they intended it to do. I heard a lot about that when I was there and think it deserves a post. The Kiwis handled the matter in a way that I found very impressive.
I have also read a lot that makes me wonder whether I would want to survive a nuclear disaster. This, of course, also makes me wonder whether other people would feel the same way.
Since disaster risk reduction is a very good idea to avoid deaths and damage or make them less, I think we need to do disaster risk reduction with nuclear war and with nuclear power use as well.
The simplest way to do this with nuclear war is not to have one. How we might achieve this goal is harder.
Russia and the USA have many more nuclear weapons than any other countries.
If we leave the decisions about these weapons to our politicians of these countries, we will end up nuking each other in the near future. I do not like this idea, nor do a lot of Americans. I believe the numbers of Americans who do not like this are the vast majority.
According to some statistics I have read, over half of Russians do not like this either.
I am not sure what is happening in Russia about this matter, but a lot of Americans are very discouraged about nuclear weapons to the point of being fatalistic about it. Many young Americans have a resigned attitude about it and think they will die before their time.
I think Americans and Russians as well as other nuclear weapons nations like China, France, the UK, India, Pakistan, Israel, Belgium, Germany, Netherlands, Italy, Turkey, and North Korea, should find a way to do disaster risk reduction with nuclear weapons.
I think I can help a little by giving people some information to use for thinking about nuclear disaster risk reduction. Not that many people read my blog now, but the number is going up fast. All I can do is try, so I will.
I do not think nuclear power is a great idea either, so I will provide information for those who agree on this or are willing to think about it.
Below I have included a map of nuclear power in countries of the world. It also includes countries that have nuclear power plants in the planning and building stages.
This is a file from the Wikimedia Commons.
http://www.wise-uranium.org/img/uresw.gif
I found it interesting that Canada has very large uranium deposits, yet does not use any nuclear power. They have a great abundance of hydroelectric power, and a small population, so they do not have a need for nuclear power.
New Zealand got into financial difficulty with paying for a nuclear power plant that did not do what they intended it to do. I heard a lot about that when I was there and think it deserves a post. The Kiwis handled the matter in a way that I found very impressive.
Sunday, April 29, 2012
Alaskan Nuclear Weapons Freeze
I am very proud of Alaska for doing this:
http://www.ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/Alaska_Nuclear_Weapons_Freeze_Measure_%281986%29
Alaska Nuclear Weapons Freeze Measure (1986)
From Ballotpedia
The language on the ballot said:
- "The initiative would officially recognize that the prevention of nuclear war is the greatest challenge facing the Earth and that the nuclear arms race dangerously increases the risk of a war that would destroy humanity. The initiative would promote mutual and verifiable nuclear weapons freeze, to be followed by nuclear weapons reduction. The initiative would direct the governor to conduct the state's affairs in conformity with the initiative's goals. "
| Alaska Nuclear Weapons Freeze Measure (1986) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yes or no | Votes | Percentage | ||
 Yes
| - | 58.4% | ||
| No | - | 41.6% | ||
| Total votes | - | 100% precincts | ||
It seems like a good idea for more countries and states, provinces, etc. to do this.
I do not know whether the average Alaskan voted for this nuclear weapons freeze, with the nuclear test bombing of Amchitka Island in mind or not. The understanding of just how bad the consequences are for the Amchitka nuclear bomb tests, have only been revealed gradually.
Amchitka used to be inhabited by Alaskan Natives. Many Aleutian Alaskan Natives were forcibly evacuated from their homes during WWII according to some material I read. There is quite a bit about it. This is not a shining moment for the USA. Here is a link to a site on a book about it:
http://www.nps.gov/aleu/historyculture/unangan-internment.htm
United States citizens were forcibly and even violently evacuated from their homes, and then interned in camps. Their villages were burned in their sight as they were taken away on ships to be imprisoned.
This is not something that I had been aware of before I began research for these posts. I find it distressing.
This evacuation is the reason that Amchitka was not inhabited when nuclear bombs tests were done there. It saddens me to think that those people will never be able to go home again, nor will many generations of their children and children's children.
This is all the more reason why we can not trust politicians and military with nukes. The average people in the street and in their homes and workplaces need to take this option away. We do not need nuclear weapons and we do not need nuclear power plants. We can not live with them. We can live without them.
This is not on topic, but it is so good I have to share it for those interested. It is an entire video about the dead zone around Chernobyl, especially the wolves that live there. http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/episodes/radioactive-wolves/introduction/7108/
I do not know whether the average Alaskan voted for this nuclear weapons freeze, with the nuclear test bombing of Amchitka Island in mind or not. The understanding of just how bad the consequences are for the Amchitka nuclear bomb tests, have only been revealed gradually.
Amchitka used to be inhabited by Alaskan Natives. Many Aleutian Alaskan Natives were forcibly evacuated from their homes during WWII according to some material I read. There is quite a bit about it. This is not a shining moment for the USA. Here is a link to a site on a book about it:
http://www.nps.gov/aleu/historyculture/unangan-internment.htm
United States citizens were forcibly and even violently evacuated from their homes, and then interned in camps. Their villages were burned in their sight as they were taken away on ships to be imprisoned.
This is not something that I had been aware of before I began research for these posts. I find it distressing.
This evacuation is the reason that Amchitka was not inhabited when nuclear bombs tests were done there. It saddens me to think that those people will never be able to go home again, nor will many generations of their children and children's children.
This is all the more reason why we can not trust politicians and military with nukes. The average people in the street and in their homes and workplaces need to take this option away. We do not need nuclear weapons and we do not need nuclear power plants. We can not live with them. We can live without them.
This is not on topic, but it is so good I have to share it for those interested. It is an entire video about the dead zone around Chernobyl, especially the wolves that live there. http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/episodes/radioactive-wolves/introduction/7108/
Saturday, April 28, 2012
Various National Nuclear Waste Repositories
If a country uses any nuclear power for either peacetime or war reasons, that country will have to dispose of nuclear wastes. That means finding a place to put the nuclear wastes. This brings up a NIMBY, or Not In My Back Yard, problem. It is almost inevitable that an area with a smaller population is going to get the nuclear wastes deposited in their back yard.
The UK is currently fighting over this matter because they have kept their nuclear wastes without a permanent home for a very long time. Since the UK was one of the earliest producers of nuclear wastes they must have a lot of it. I can see why the battle over where to put it is rather heated. I can't say even a little nuclear waste is a pleasant prospect to have in my back yard.
Here is a list of potential sites for the nuclear waste in the UK:
The UK is currently fighting over this matter because they have kept their nuclear wastes without a permanent home for a very long time. Since the UK was one of the earliest producers of nuclear wastes they must have a lot of it. I can see why the battle over where to put it is rather heated. I can't say even a little nuclear waste is a pleasant prospect to have in my back yard.
Here is a list of potential sites for the nuclear waste in the UK:
Adjacent to Bradwell nuclear power station in Essex
Ministry of Defence land on Potton Island, 8 km from Southend on Sea. Essex
Under the North Sea, accessed from the port at Redcar, Yorkshire
Under the sea between the Inner Hebrides and Northern Ireland, accessed from the port at Hunterston in North Ayrshire
Killingholme, South Humberside
Ministry of Defence training area, Stanford, Norfolk
Adjacent to Dounreay nuclear plant in Caithness
Two sites near the Sellafield nuclear plant in Cumbria
Altnabreac in Caithness 18 km south of Dounreay
Fuday, small, uninhabited island north of Barra in the Western Isles
Sandray, small, uninhabited island south of Barra in the Western Isles
This list is from the "New Scientist" site.
The following countries are also investigating sites for deep underground disposal of nuclear wastes:
Finland, Switzerland, Sweden, Belgium and France.
The USA already has a nuclear waste disposal site. It is called the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) for weapons waste in a salt formation 655 metres under the Chihuahuan Desert near Carlsbad in New Mexico. Another site is being considered. It is Yucca Mountain in the Nevada desert. The Carlsbad, New Mexico one is for weapons waste disposal and the Yucca Mountain one is supposed to be for nuclear power plant disposal.
Here is a link to a pdf map of how much spent nuclear fuel is located in each of the states of the USA:
http://www.nei.org/resourcesandstats/documentlibrary/nuclearwastedisposal/graphicsandcharts/used-nuclear-fuel-storage-map/
This map shows Alaska as having zero tons of spent nuclear fuel. I do not believe this to be true, since three atomic bombs were tested here. Perhaps it is a semantics thing and they don't think it counts as spent fuel.
They can use whatever words for it they want. I expect close examination of the vicinity would turn up a cousin to Blinky, the three-eyed fish, from the Simpsons cartoons.
The three nuclear test bombings were conducted on an island named Amchitka. "The island is actually part of a small crustal block being torn apart by oblique subduction — and is therefore one of the least stable tectonic environments in the United States."
The above quote was from "Nuclear Stewardship: Lessons from a Not-So-Remote Island " by John Eichelberger, Jeff Freymueller, Graham Hill and Matt Patrick .
The most important part that I took away from the above is that a lake formed by the nuclear bomb test on Amchitka is going to end up in the ocean.
This is a big risk to international fishing. A lot of international ship traffic goes by there. It is closer than it appears on most maps. When shipping goes through the Northwest Passage at a good clip, it will pass by Amchitka too.
Radioactive lake water in the ocean will be distinctly bad for the Aleutian Islands residents. It will not be good for Petropavlovsk-Kamchatksky, Russia either. That city is closer to Amchitka, than Anchorage Alaska is.
Greenpeace started up over the nuclear bomb tests at Amchitka. That was before anyone even knew just how bad an idea they were. Tectonic plate theory was not advanced enough to tell us about how geologically unstable Amchitka is. There is no known way to mitigate the danger from the Amchitka nuclear bomb test site.
Finland, Switzerland, Sweden, Belgium and France.
The USA already has a nuclear waste disposal site. It is called the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) for weapons waste in a salt formation 655 metres under the Chihuahuan Desert near Carlsbad in New Mexico. Another site is being considered. It is Yucca Mountain in the Nevada desert. The Carlsbad, New Mexico one is for weapons waste disposal and the Yucca Mountain one is supposed to be for nuclear power plant disposal.
Here is a link to a pdf map of how much spent nuclear fuel is located in each of the states of the USA:
http://www.nei.org/resourcesandstats/documentlibrary/nuclearwastedisposal/graphicsandcharts/used-nuclear-fuel-storage-map/
This map shows Alaska as having zero tons of spent nuclear fuel. I do not believe this to be true, since three atomic bombs were tested here. Perhaps it is a semantics thing and they don't think it counts as spent fuel.
They can use whatever words for it they want. I expect close examination of the vicinity would turn up a cousin to Blinky, the three-eyed fish, from the Simpsons cartoons.
The three nuclear test bombings were conducted on an island named Amchitka. "The island is actually part of a small crustal block being torn apart by oblique subduction — and is therefore one of the least stable tectonic environments in the United States."
The above quote was from "Nuclear Stewardship: Lessons from a Not-So-Remote Island " by John Eichelberger, Jeff Freymueller, Graham Hill and Matt Patrick .
The most important part that I took away from the above is that a lake formed by the nuclear bomb test on Amchitka is going to end up in the ocean.
This is a big risk to international fishing. A lot of international ship traffic goes by there. It is closer than it appears on most maps. When shipping goes through the Northwest Passage at a good clip, it will pass by Amchitka too.
Radioactive lake water in the ocean will be distinctly bad for the Aleutian Islands residents. It will not be good for Petropavlovsk-Kamchatksky, Russia either. That city is closer to Amchitka, than Anchorage Alaska is.
Greenpeace started up over the nuclear bomb tests at Amchitka. That was before anyone even knew just how bad an idea they were. Tectonic plate theory was not advanced enough to tell us about how geologically unstable Amchitka is. There is no known way to mitigate the danger from the Amchitka nuclear bomb test site.
Friday, April 27, 2012
There have already been three serious nuclear accidents worldwide. Some people do not know them, so I will list them. Chernobyl in Russia, Three Mile Island in the USA, and Fukishima in Japan.
These three countries have some of the best resources in the world to prevent such disasters. If this is how three of the world's most affluent and technologically advanced countries, Russia, the USA, and Japan, take care of safety in their nuclear power plants, we are all in trouble.
Germany decided to phase out nuclear power in their country after the horrible examples of Fukushima, Three Mile Island, and Chernobyl. Perhaps it is time for the rest of the nuclear-power-using countries to do the same.
"An analysis carried out by Nature and Columbia University, New York, shows that two-thirds of the world's 211 power plants have more people living within a 30-kilometre radius than the 172,000 people living within 30 kilometres of the Fukushima Daiichi plant."
That was a quote from the "Nature" site about nuclear power plants and the number of humans near them. Here is a link to that site: http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110421/full/472400a.html
Nature went on to say, "Some 21 plants have populations larger than 1 million within that radius, and six have populations larger than 3 million."
It is not as though the radiation from a nuclear power plant disaster all stays in the area where it occurs. Debris from the Japanese nuclear disaster traveled long distances, including the coast of the state of Alaska, where I live, and to California and the rest of the West Coast of the USA and to Canada.
There is not a single nuclear power plant in the state of Alaska, yet we got the dubious benefit of radiation from those in Japan anyway.
Nuclear power plants affect us all whether we have one near us or not. Nuclear power plants are the business of the entire world.
The operation of a nuclear power plant is nothing compared to the remains of spent fuel and the dismantling of a no-longer useful nuclear power plant. Nuclear waste repository sites offer much more excitement to life for many more people. Just about everyone is involved when you consider the routes traveled to ship the nuclear wastes to those sites.
I have not found an actual map of these routes yet. Oddly enough, the sites I have tried to access so far are no longer there. An article about them did mention that one out of seven people in the USA would live along proposed shipping routes for nuclear wastes.
If you live in the USA you can find out about some of this by using a site called, "local". Just type in your town and nuclear wastes or nuclear waste shipping routes. Here is a link to the local site:
http://www.local.com
These three countries have some of the best resources in the world to prevent such disasters. If this is how three of the world's most affluent and technologically advanced countries, Russia, the USA, and Japan, take care of safety in their nuclear power plants, we are all in trouble.
Germany decided to phase out nuclear power in their country after the horrible examples of Fukushima, Three Mile Island, and Chernobyl. Perhaps it is time for the rest of the nuclear-power-using countries to do the same.
"An analysis carried out by Nature and Columbia University, New York, shows that two-thirds of the world's 211 power plants have more people living within a 30-kilometre radius than the 172,000 people living within 30 kilometres of the Fukushima Daiichi plant."
That was a quote from the "Nature" site about nuclear power plants and the number of humans near them. Here is a link to that site: http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110421/full/472400a.html
Nature went on to say, "Some 21 plants have populations larger than 1 million within that radius, and six have populations larger than 3 million."
It is not as though the radiation from a nuclear power plant disaster all stays in the area where it occurs. Debris from the Japanese nuclear disaster traveled long distances, including the coast of the state of Alaska, where I live, and to California and the rest of the West Coast of the USA and to Canada.
There is not a single nuclear power plant in the state of Alaska, yet we got the dubious benefit of radiation from those in Japan anyway.
Nuclear power plants affect us all whether we have one near us or not. Nuclear power plants are the business of the entire world.
The operation of a nuclear power plant is nothing compared to the remains of spent fuel and the dismantling of a no-longer useful nuclear power plant. Nuclear waste repository sites offer much more excitement to life for many more people. Just about everyone is involved when you consider the routes traveled to ship the nuclear wastes to those sites.
I have not found an actual map of these routes yet. Oddly enough, the sites I have tried to access so far are no longer there. An article about them did mention that one out of seven people in the USA would live along proposed shipping routes for nuclear wastes.
If you live in the USA you can find out about some of this by using a site called, "local". Just type in your town and nuclear wastes or nuclear waste shipping routes. Here is a link to the local site:
http://www.local.com
Thursday, April 26, 2012
My Personal Experience With Nuclear Power "Accidents"
I grew up in an area that started off free of nuclear power plants. That changed when I was in High School. They decided to build a nuclear power plant on the beach less than ten miles from where I lived. This is the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant.
Lots of people came from all over the United States and even from other countries to protest building this nuclear power plant. They most often held signs grimly, near the security gates of the building site. One time there was a very large protest and a lot of people were arrested. The local courts were completely overwhelmed with the numbers of protesters. They had to get outside help to avoid breaking US law by keeping the protesters too long without charges. It discourages me to think that would not happen, since the passage of laws that make a mockery of the US Constitution, and allow arrests without charges and indefinite imprisonment. I digress, however.
None of this stopped the power plant from being built and put into operation. I learned much more than I wanted to about nuclear power plants, and that one in particular, because it was so close to where I lived.
One of the worst things that I learned about nuclear power plants is that they can be built by real idiots. The thing that impressed this on me the most was mistakes that were made by builders and the lies they told about them.
The first one was that there was no danger of any earthquakes in the area of the power plant. It was made public that the builders knew that an earthquake fault had been found that was very close to the power plant. The builders had been assuring the local public that there were no nearby faults during a time when they knew that the opposite was true.
The next thing that came out, was that someone had designed the containment domes to be mirror images of each other. The designer had decided that it would be a good idea to save money by designing one containment dome and letting the builders flip the blueprint to mirror image the other containment dome and build it from the same blueprint.
You are right if you guessed that the builders neglected to flip the blueprint and built the second dome wrong. The second dome did not pass inspection for safety because the metal reinforcement inside it was in the wrong areas to hold up for containing a reaction.
They decided that it would cost too much money to tear the second containment dome down and start over. Instead, they simply added metal reinforcements in places they should have been in the first place. This was in addition to the metal reinforcements that were in the wrong places. The builders informed the public that we actually had a bonus as a result of the initial mistake. Our second containment building was extra secure because it was stronger because of the extra mental reinforcements inside it.
My view, which was popular, was that it really worried me that such chuckle heads, who could not even manage to build the nuclear power plant, were planning to fire it up and operate it.
It was not reassuring to think that we might need both of those containment buildings because of the earthquake fault nearby, either.
This post is getting too long, so I will continue on the subject.
Lots of people came from all over the United States and even from other countries to protest building this nuclear power plant. They most often held signs grimly, near the security gates of the building site. One time there was a very large protest and a lot of people were arrested. The local courts were completely overwhelmed with the numbers of protesters. They had to get outside help to avoid breaking US law by keeping the protesters too long without charges. It discourages me to think that would not happen, since the passage of laws that make a mockery of the US Constitution, and allow arrests without charges and indefinite imprisonment. I digress, however.
None of this stopped the power plant from being built and put into operation. I learned much more than I wanted to about nuclear power plants, and that one in particular, because it was so close to where I lived.
One of the worst things that I learned about nuclear power plants is that they can be built by real idiots. The thing that impressed this on me the most was mistakes that were made by builders and the lies they told about them.
The first one was that there was no danger of any earthquakes in the area of the power plant. It was made public that the builders knew that an earthquake fault had been found that was very close to the power plant. The builders had been assuring the local public that there were no nearby faults during a time when they knew that the opposite was true.
The next thing that came out, was that someone had designed the containment domes to be mirror images of each other. The designer had decided that it would be a good idea to save money by designing one containment dome and letting the builders flip the blueprint to mirror image the other containment dome and build it from the same blueprint.
You are right if you guessed that the builders neglected to flip the blueprint and built the second dome wrong. The second dome did not pass inspection for safety because the metal reinforcement inside it was in the wrong areas to hold up for containing a reaction.
They decided that it would cost too much money to tear the second containment dome down and start over. Instead, they simply added metal reinforcements in places they should have been in the first place. This was in addition to the metal reinforcements that were in the wrong places. The builders informed the public that we actually had a bonus as a result of the initial mistake. Our second containment building was extra secure because it was stronger because of the extra mental reinforcements inside it.
My view, which was popular, was that it really worried me that such chuckle heads, who could not even manage to build the nuclear power plant, were planning to fire it up and operate it.
It was not reassuring to think that we might need both of those containment buildings because of the earthquake fault nearby, either.
This post is getting too long, so I will continue on the subject.
Thursday, April 19, 2012
How You Can Prevent Nuclear War
I am going to tell you how you can stop a nuclear war in this post. It won't be easy, but dying of radiation sickness is probably worse.
My research for this blog takes me to interesting places on the internet at times. One of those is the F.A.S., Or the Federation of American Scientists. Here is a link to their site.
http://www.fas.org/pubs/tar.html
Here is what they say about themselves:
"The founding mission was to prevent nuclear war. While nuclear security remains a major objective of FAS today, the organization has expanded its critical work at the intersection of applied science and security to include the issues of bio-security, building technologies, conventional arms sales monitoring, energy security, government secrecy, international science partnerships, learning technologies, and terrorism analysis."
I like their ideas, because I would like for life on earth to survive and maybe even human life and some kind of decent civilization. Out of control nuclear proliferation and the use of nuclear weapons, as a tool for countries to maintain or improve their status in the world, are not good ways to do this.
I have not begun to read all of their extensive site, but I am getting the impression that they have missed a big contribution to the likelihood of nuclear war. That is the contribution of the average citizen of countries that have nuclear weapons, and even the average citizen of countries that do not have nuclear weapons. The things that you and I do every day in the process of living our lives can affect whether we have a nuclear war.
One of the reasons that our leaders have nuclear weapons is to keep their jobs. Even fairly dictatorial leaders, like those in the USA, Russia, and the UK, (:-) know that they will not keep their jobs if the people of their country get too dissatisfied with them. We are all used to a certain standard of living that is much better than the rest of the world and we want to keep it.
One of the things that keeps that standard of living so high is the use of large quantities of fuel. The amount of fuel used in your country goes down, so does your standard of living. I got a good look at that during the Middle East oil crisis.
Rationing was done by even or odd numbers on license plates. Long lines formed at the pumps all the time. Fights broke out in line if someone cut in. People stole and switched license plates. Our politicians got an earful from the voters.
Our leaders know they will be out if they don't keep the fuel flowing to us.
Even if we don't have our own private swimming pool and palatial mansion, we use much more fuel than the rest of the world does. Some of that is pretty scandalous waste, if you consider that it may cause a nuclear war to start. It is time for us to take a look at how we live and how we use resources.
Are you willing to die for the "right" to drive around in a heavy multiple passenger car every day by yourself? How many lives is it worth to keep the thermostat on your heater up a few degrees? These are only the beginning of the decisions we need to reconsider.
My research for this blog takes me to interesting places on the internet at times. One of those is the F.A.S., Or the Federation of American Scientists. Here is a link to their site.
http://www.fas.org/pubs/tar.html
Here is what they say about themselves:
"The founding mission was to prevent nuclear war. While nuclear security remains a major objective of FAS today, the organization has expanded its critical work at the intersection of applied science and security to include the issues of bio-security, building technologies, conventional arms sales monitoring, energy security, government secrecy, international science partnerships, learning technologies, and terrorism analysis."
I like their ideas, because I would like for life on earth to survive and maybe even human life and some kind of decent civilization. Out of control nuclear proliferation and the use of nuclear weapons, as a tool for countries to maintain or improve their status in the world, are not good ways to do this.
I have not begun to read all of their extensive site, but I am getting the impression that they have missed a big contribution to the likelihood of nuclear war. That is the contribution of the average citizen of countries that have nuclear weapons, and even the average citizen of countries that do not have nuclear weapons. The things that you and I do every day in the process of living our lives can affect whether we have a nuclear war.
One of the reasons that our leaders have nuclear weapons is to keep their jobs. Even fairly dictatorial leaders, like those in the USA, Russia, and the UK, (:-) know that they will not keep their jobs if the people of their country get too dissatisfied with them. We are all used to a certain standard of living that is much better than the rest of the world and we want to keep it.
One of the things that keeps that standard of living so high is the use of large quantities of fuel. The amount of fuel used in your country goes down, so does your standard of living. I got a good look at that during the Middle East oil crisis.
Rationing was done by even or odd numbers on license plates. Long lines formed at the pumps all the time. Fights broke out in line if someone cut in. People stole and switched license plates. Our politicians got an earful from the voters.
Our leaders know they will be out if they don't keep the fuel flowing to us.
Even if we don't have our own private swimming pool and palatial mansion, we use much more fuel than the rest of the world does. Some of that is pretty scandalous waste, if you consider that it may cause a nuclear war to start. It is time for us to take a look at how we live and how we use resources.
Are you willing to die for the "right" to drive around in a heavy multiple passenger car every day by yourself? How many lives is it worth to keep the thermostat on your heater up a few degrees? These are only the beginning of the decisions we need to reconsider.
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
What You Need To Know About Nuclear Terrorism
There are many things you can do to help you survive a nuclear terrorist attack. No doubt about it. Nukes are a very discouraging subject, but they should not be.
This is one of those things where what you don't know will harm you. Knowledge on the subject of a nuclear or dirty bomb terrorist attack can save your life. Ignorance will kill you.
First I have to tell you that you need to be worried enough, to do what you need to do to stay alive, through a dirty bomb or nuke attack. Do not be discouraged, keep reading to the part where it tells you what to do about it.
Graham Allison, director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University and former Assistant Secretary of Defense under President Clinton, said that he is surprised that we have not already been hit with a dirty bomb by terrorists. He said it is even more surprising that Israel has not experienced one. He went on to express the opinion that this sort of attack pales into insignificance compared to the prospect of a terrorist attack using a nuclear weapon.
Allison said that the equivalent of a 15 kiloton nuclear bomb would fit inside the van that Timothy McVeigh used in Oklahoma City. He said that a nuke instead of planes in the World Trade Center would have taken out the whole Southern tip of Manhattan.
Okay. I hate all this myself, but as awful as this all sounds, Allison still thinks we need to know how to prepare for nuclear terrorist attacks because there are effective things we can do about it.
Homeland Security has a succinct 10 page guide on what to do if a nuclear disaster is imminent. They say in the guide that they expect most people to begin reading at the last minute. I certainly hope that my readers are not going to do this. You should know a lot more than the 10 page guide in order to survive and stay healthy, but it is better than nothing. It does give you a better chance.
Here is a link to the PDF of it, I hope you print it out immediately and even read it and get the supplies ready that are suggested. I am posting this stuff every day because I do not want people, including, you, dear reader, to die when you don't need to. Read it. Act on it. Stay alive and healthy.
This is one of those things where what you don't know will harm you. Knowledge on the subject of a nuclear or dirty bomb terrorist attack can save your life. Ignorance will kill you.
First I have to tell you that you need to be worried enough, to do what you need to do to stay alive, through a dirty bomb or nuke attack. Do not be discouraged, keep reading to the part where it tells you what to do about it.
Graham Allison, director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University and former Assistant Secretary of Defense under President Clinton, said that he is surprised that we have not already been hit with a dirty bomb by terrorists. He said it is even more surprising that Israel has not experienced one. He went on to express the opinion that this sort of attack pales into insignificance compared to the prospect of a terrorist attack using a nuclear weapon.
Allison said that the equivalent of a 15 kiloton nuclear bomb would fit inside the van that Timothy McVeigh used in Oklahoma City. He said that a nuke instead of planes in the World Trade Center would have taken out the whole Southern tip of Manhattan.
Okay. I hate all this myself, but as awful as this all sounds, Allison still thinks we need to know how to prepare for nuclear terrorist attacks because there are effective things we can do about it.
Homeland Security has a succinct 10 page guide on what to do if a nuclear disaster is imminent. They say in the guide that they expect most people to begin reading at the last minute. I certainly hope that my readers are not going to do this. You should know a lot more than the 10 page guide in order to survive and stay healthy, but it is better than nothing. It does give you a better chance.
Here is a link to the PDF of it, I hope you print it out immediately and even read it and get the supplies ready that are suggested. I am posting this stuff every day because I do not want people, including, you, dear reader, to die when you don't need to. Read it. Act on it. Stay alive and healthy.
http://www.ki4u.com/guide.pdf
If you happen to be one of those sensible types that don't want to click links, that is a short enough internet address that you can type it into your browser. Please do so.
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