LANL Warning About Radioactive Trees 263
coryboehne writes "KOB-TV in Albuquerque is reporting that Los Alamos National Labs is warning personnel who are cutting trees in a canyon east of Los Alamos that some trees in the area might be radioactive.
The canyon, known as Bayo Canyon, was formerly known as Technical Area 10, and was used for weapons testing from the 1940s until 1961. A full summary of Environmental Direct Penetrating Radation in the Los Alamos area is available from the LANL Meteorology & Air Quality Group"
Get yours now (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Get yours now (Score:2)
C'mon, somebody mod this guy up.
Re:Get yours now (Score:3, Funny)
[obscure Simpsons quote]
Re:Get yours now (Score:2)
Christmas trees that glow in the dark...hmmm.
Absolutely brilliant.
What are they talking about... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:What are they talking about... (Score:5, Insightful)
Bottom line: it can have terrible consequences, but it can also be construed as being something that has done much more.
Re:What are they talking about... (Score:2)
Re:What are they talking about... (Score:2)
Re:What are they talking about... (Score:2)
Actually, much research has been done on this topic. Conclusions from everyone have been that fewer than 100,000 people would have been killed (on both sides) during a ground invasion of Japan.
Do a little Googling [google.com], and please help dispel this belief that dropping atomic bombs on Japan saved any lives.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:What are they talking about... (Score:2, Insightful)
I will not argue that the firestorms in Dresden and other cities were less horrific than the atomic bombings.
I will argue that the targeting and wholesale slaughter of large civilian populations is inexcusable. It is an atrocity. It is a war crime.
I am a casual student of the Manhattan Project and its result. There was a time when I accepted the official justification for the use of those two bombs. I no longer do. One of them, the implosion bomb which was not certain to work, could have been detonated over the sea as a demonstration. Yes, as it happened the Japanese warlords refused to surrender even after the destruction of Hiroshima. That has no relevance whatsoever. Even if doing the right thing wouldn't have worked, we still had the responsibility to do it. We had no way of knowing it wouldn't work. And we knew that the gun-type bomb would work, so we could still have used it on a city. (Not that I think that that is a morally justifiable action, either.)
There is quite a lot of evidence to indicate that, ultimately, the decision to use the bombs was more political than military in nature.
I think that, aside from the firebombing and nuking of civilian populations, the Allies acted nobly during WWII and they rid the world of two rapacious regimes that were arguably deeply evil. I believe in the essential goodness, or at least decency, of my government and of my fellow citizens and I have no desire to be in any sense a self-hating American. In fact, I despise those who have made this the core of their beliefs.
But I also despise the equally unthinking, and jingoistic and narcissistic hypocrisy that takes a self-righteous accusatory stance against the actions of other nations but which is incapable of critically evaluating our own. The US has committed atrocities.
Every day one can go to various web forums and read the outraged views of Americans who say, "How can anyone be so evil, so inhuman, so unfeeling as to kill those thousands of innocent civilians in the World Trade Center?". They believe that there must be something fundamentally wrong with "those people". And then they do things like spit on a vaguely Arabic looking person on the street. The evildoer rarely believes that he is an evildoer and, quite often, he believes that he is an agent of righteousness. In WWII we were, in fact, the "Good Guys". That doesn't mean that we didn't do Very Bad Things. Our refusal to recognize or atone for our nuclear destruction and torture of housewives, shopkeepers, tourists, and schoolchildren is a deep stain on our national moral character.
I am not apologizing for the Japanese. They are, perhaps, no less hypocritical. While they would like us to apologize for the hundreds of thousands killed in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, they have, until recently, refused to even acknowledge the millions of people they killed in China, particularly Nanking.
Re:What are they talking about... (Score:3, Insightful)
Unfortunatly i dont agree that we bombed the enemy. Although we didn't bomb US soldiers the civilians who were killed were not enemies of ours. When the war ended the Japanese didn't harbor the same hatred and agression that we did after 9-11 that we do towards Middle Eastern people.
Re:What are they talking about... (Score:2)
Please read more about the history of WWII from multiple angles (Asian, Eupoean, and American points of view) then come back and try again.
<hint>
In the early 40's, the world was at war. September 11th, the world was pretty much as peace except the jewish and muslim exteremist who will always hate each other.
</hint>
Re:What are they talking about... (Score:2)
Of course they were. I suggest you look into the Japanese mindset of the time. For anybody there not to defend their homeland would have been considered dishonorable. Not only to themselves, but to their family and ancestors. Quite a large motiving factor.
When the US dropped the bombs, Japan was arming it citizenry and preparing for invasion. Old men, children, women. Who could you consider a non-combatant? The US did try to warn the civilian populace with flyers saying to leave city, but how could proud Japanese flee from supporting their war machine?
The Japanese people were in complete and utter shock when their surrender was sounded, even after knowing their losses after two bombs, a lot of people still wanted to keep fighting.
Yes, dropping the bomb was a horrible thing. It was a crime against humanity to indescriminately kill so many people. (which was, by the way, not the main goal, the bombs hit major production cities) Their is however, overwelming evidence that more people would have died in an invasion. It is quite a moral quandry.
The difference between the US here, and Radical Fundamentalists of the modern era is that the US struck out in the goal of peace. We just wanted there to be no more fighting. The only thing about them we wanted to change was their ability to attack US. The US spent billions of dollars rebuilding Japan, and it today stands a world leader.
Terrorists however, want to change us. What would we have to do to avoid their continued attacks? Not only would the US have to pull out of Arabia, Israel relocate to Ohio, and everybody everywhere convert to Islam. But there would still be terrorists. Even if women are muslim, how dare they show their face in public! Wipe out unclean industry (music,tv,alcolhol,broadway,schools where women can attend) also, thereby destroying the world economy and pluging into depression. Even if we did all of that, somebody somewhere would still find it in them to hate us.
There can be no peace from those that will not accept poeple different than them. The only way to beat terrorism is education and economic support. Only once Arabs teach their children not to hate those different from them (which a good portion already does) will we have peace in the middle east.
Coal plants emit airborne radioactivity (Score:4, Insightful)
Do you like acid rain, deforestation, and resperatory ailments. Then close down the nuke plants. Then you'll either have to switch to coal, hope for a miracle, or change your standard of living (sorry now 1000 watt Itaniums for you instead you can freeze in the dark.)
Re:Coal plants emit airborne radioactivity (Score:3, Informative)
That made sense. Nuke plants are virtually pollution free (aside from carefully controlled solid radioactive waste). Closing down nuke plants won't affect acid rain, deforestation, or resperatory illness in any of those ways.
To have your post make sense, switch it around so it says "Do you like those problems? No? Then close down coal plants. Then you'll either have to switch to nuclear, hope for a miracle, or change your standard of living"
--
Abortions for some, miniature American flags for others! - Kodos
Re:Coal plants emit airborne radioactivity (Score:2)
My first sentence should have read..."That made NO sense"
Radioactive Squirrels? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Radioactive Squirrels? (Score:2)
Mr. Burns: Pish-posh...that tree over there held 6 barrels.
Re:Radioactive Squirrels? (Score:5, Funny)
Do said trees have radioactive squirrels?
In another time, a teenager bitten by a radioactive squirrel would have been a great idea for a superhero.
"The Flying Squirrel" explained! (Score:2)
Re:Radioactive Squirrels? (Score:2)
Yes.
Those squirrels are radioactive. In fact, any squirrel in any tree is radioactive. Other radioactive things include chipmunks, bananas, houses, and Al Gore. Any substance made up of certain elements that have naturally occuring radioactive isotopes are radioactive.
That's the problem. It's so easy to make fun of radioactivity that you can attach the word "radioactive" to virtually anything. Then it becomes the butt of jokes, protested by environmentalists, and regulated by the government.
These Las Alamos trees, for example, are barely more radioactive than they should be. In fact, the report mentioned that it was hard to even discern these more-radioactive-than-normal trees because of small fluctations in background radiation.
These trees are harmless, and so are the squirrels.
--
Abortions for some, miniature American flags for others! - Kodos
Re:Radioactive Squirrels? (Score:2)
but only if they ate nuts off of the radioactive trees.
Yet another reason to never eat squirrels.
Smokey the Bear... (Score:3, Funny)
Oh geez, he's puking, and his hair is falling out
Weapons? (Score:5, Funny)
Wooden missles? (Score:5, Funny)
If you want to describe (Score:5, Funny)
I will duck.
Ballista anyone? (Score:2)
"Right Away!"
"As you wish"
"Stop Touching Me!"
"Don't you have a kingdom to run?"
Sorry, I played a little too much Warcraft II when I was in high school...
Re:Ballista anyone? (Score:2)
Of course, a ballista with one of these trees in it would call the wrath of the UN down on ones heads.
I could just imagine the weapons inspectors too
those trees, and every splinter is going to need to be accounted for, you know.
The sawdust could be used by terrorists!!!
Call out the national guard!
Think of the children!!!
Re:If you want to describe (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Weapons? (Score:2)
That is the worst idea I have ever heard *shakes head*
</office space>
Re:Weapons? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Weapons? (Score:2)
"Sheesh, the Jonesnskis all died. Their hair and teeth fell out and they then bled to death through cracks in their skin."
"Cool, my husbund... didn't they have that barrel that the Smithskis had just before they died in the same mysterious manner?"
"Why yes they did, my little babooshka"
"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"
"Yeah! The mysterious always warm barrel is available! I'll go start the mule to drag it home!"
--
Evan
I can see it now... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:I can see it now... (Score:2)
Re:I can see it now... (Score:2)
Re:I can see it now... (Score:2)
The first indication... (Score:5, Funny)
I can see it now... (Score:5, Funny)
Father: Oh, you don't have anything to worry about.
Child: How come, Daddy?
Father: Well you see son, our house was built with radioactive trees, so the entire house is like a big night light.
Child: Is that why my hamster got cancer?
Father: No more questions, time for sleep.
xmas (Score:5, Funny)
think of the money on electricity you'd save !
Obligatory Simpson's reference (Score:5, Funny)
If you didn't get it, read this script [snpp.com].
Comment removed (Score:3, Funny)
It's easy to tell (Score:4, Funny)
Forest Fire? (Score:5, Interesting)
Let's not forget that recently the Los Alamos area was on fire from forest fires.
Not really... the dose levels are still really low (Score:5, Informative)
Inhalation would be worse? (Score:2)
Re:Forest Fire? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Forest Fire? (Score:3, Informative)
Check your food and medicine labels for cellulose. Most of it comes from wood pulp.
Excuse me? (Score:4, Funny)
What the heck is an "extream hazord"?
If you meant extreme hazard, the answer is no: I live upwind of Los Alamos.
Trees probably aren't risky, but other areas are (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Trees probably aren't risky, but other areas ar (Score:2, Informative)
5 rem is the maximum allowable occupational total effective dose equivalent (10CFR20.1201). Assuming that you don't work in a nuclear plant or other facility licensed to use radioactive materials, then 10CFR20.1301 applies instead:
These limits don't apply to radioactive trees, of course -- at least not these radioactive trees, since they don't arise from licensed activities.
Do note that dose as low as you postulate is unlikely to have harmful effects, particularly because the dose would be spread out over time. These are the effects from acute doses of radiation of varying intensities:
As you can see, a non-acute dose as low as would be expected from these trees really shouldn't harm anyone.
Re:Trees probably aren't risky, but other areas ar (Score:2)
Re:Trees probably aren't risky, but other areas ar (Score:5, Interesting)
also people who work in those areas wear Dosimeters. SO they KNOW for sure that people are not being exposed. Even the town dump is ringed with dosimeters. What about your town. Got any dosimeters? Lots of industries produce rad waste. to name a few: phosphate fertilizer plants, (old) ceramics, coleman laterns, glow in the dark exit signs, hospital isotope waste and manufacture.... For example, the dosimeters in our town have gone off lots of times. One time was a vet disposing of radioactive kitty litter (radioactive iodide is used as a medical treatment). Another time my neighbor set of the alarm because he was wearing pile (patagonia) jackets which if you did not know collect Radon gas that accumualtes in poorly vented closets in many parts of the country. Another time a load of radioactive steel manufactured in mexico drove through town on its way elsewhere. (the mexicans plant hat recycled and melted down a hospital cesium canister. Many steelworkers and truckers in the US and Mexico received high doses, something like a dozen people at the steel plant eventually died of exposre related illnesesses.
So the good news about living in los alamos is that we know we're no being irradiated cause we monitor it. You dont know and there are lots of ways you could be exposed. for example do you know where the steel rebar in you concrete walls came from? Are you breathing radon?
Re:Trees probably aren't risky, but other areas ar (Score:2)
Seriously, as you can see from my other posts, radiation death scares the living shit out of me. How would I go about getting a portible one of these things?
Re:Trees probably aren't risky, but other areas ar (Score:2)
One thing they did look at was radioactive materials. The bathroom where I worked got shut down because of radiation in the walls from the 1950's. Nothing that was really dangerous, but they were so hyper that they checked everyting.
Heh (Score:5, Informative)
The only test I can think of offhand that was in New Mexico was the original Trinity [enviroweb.org] bomb that was set off pre-Hiroshima.
There were, however, several criticality accidents [enviroweb.org] at Los Alamos, and several "downwind incidents" in Nevada around the same time.
See the "history" page on my site for a description of the Army SL-1 that went critical in Idaho in the 60s. That's one I didn't learn about until recently, and apparently it was a pretty hot one too. The more I research into this, the more amazed I am about the amount of contamination there is scattered around the US, and on the islands we ran tests on.
'Going Critical' is not bad (Score:5, Informative)
There is a common belief that 'going critical' is synonymous with a meltdown, or out-of-control chain reaction or manifold other bad things. This is, however, false.
A nuclear reactor is a device which creates chain reactions to amplify the effects of neutrons. The neutron multiplication factor [everything2.com] describes whether the number of neutrons present in the core is increasing, decreasing, or remaining the same. Based upon this, the following are defined:
Therefore: 1) A reactor must be critical to maintain its power. 2) A reactor must be supercritical to increase in power. Criticality and supercriticality are normal states for a reactor. It's prompt criticality which is bad.
Re:Heh (Score:2)
I believe the issue is best illustrated by a story of my dad's: When he was at university a guy stole one of those "Radiation Hazard" signs from the physics department and attached it to his scooter. This was all fine until he got in a traffic accident ~1 month later. He was pretty severly injured, but when an ambulance arrived on the scene they refused to go near him until a hazmat team came in to confirm that there was no radiation. The guy lived to tell the tale, but had his injuries been more serious the hour that it took the hazmat team to arrive could have cost him his life.
I know most of your stuff is spoofs, but you should make sure it says that somewhere...
Re:Heh (Score:2)
No different at ORNL (Score:5, Interesting)
We've had our share of radioactive frogs too, some with some, shall we say, unique anatomy. Once, on that same main road, one of these unfortunate amphibians wandered underneath the tread of one of the facility's vehicles. Again, we see the bunny suits, this time with sprayers full of this black, sticky foam. Down the road every so often, you'd see a bunnyman either spraying or scraping an already-encapsulated piece of frog from the road where the contaminated tire had deposited it.
Re:No different at ORNL (Score:5, Funny)
That describes most of my dreams since I was ten. Weird.
Re:No different at ORNL (Score:2, Interesting)
By the light of the Tennessee moon
From the bilious bubbles of a black lagoon
They make a hound dog howl a SWAT team swoon
Hot frogs on the loose
They've multiplied since '53
Slurping nuclear debris
Amphibious fabulous fancy free
Hot frogs on the loose
CHORUS:
Hippity hoppity here they come
Radioactive lookin' for fun
If you kiss 'em look out for the tongue
Hot frogs on the loose
They got little skinny legs and big bug eyes
Fraternizing's not advised
They like you like they like flies
Hot frogs on the loose
They got a chicken nugget body and a whopper leap
In your bedroom while you sleep
They'll make your Geiger counter beep
Hot frogs on the loose
CHORUS
You can put the pedal to the metal till the rubber squeals
Squish 'em with your tires you got hot wheels
How you know how it feels to be a
Hot frog on the loose
Please do not keep them as pets
Sauteing them may bring regrets
Make a citizen's arrest of a
Hot frog on the loose
Frogs for peace frogs for defense
Don't be nervous don't be tense
We've got a sure-fire three-foot fence
To keep the hot frogs from gettin loose
CHORUS
Radioactive furniture (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Radioactive furniture (Score:2, Informative)
It happened [us-mex.org]!
Nearly 13 years ago, a cancer-therapy machine was removed from the Medical Center for Specialities in Ciudad Ju rez and taken to a Ju rez junkyard that later sold the machine along with other scrap metal to two steel foundries for recycling. The machine contained 6,000 tiny pellets of radioactive Cobalt-60, which contaminated thousands of steel rebars (used to reinforce concrete) and furniture parts.
Re:Radioactive furniture (Score:2)
Nearly 13 years ago, a cancer-therapy machine was removed from the Medical Center for Specialities in Ciudad Ju rez and taken to a Ju rez junkyard that later sold the machine along with other scrap metal to two steel foundries for recycling. The machine contained 6,000 tiny pellets of radioactive Cobalt-60, which contaminated thousands of steel rebars (used to reinforce concrete) and furniture parts.
Very interesting story! The amazing part was the way they found out:
"The contaminated steel rebars soon found their way to the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, where they triggered a radiation detector."
Damn... (Score:3, Funny)
Mant (Score:5, Funny)
But...
When combined with the power of ATOMIC energy, man and ant become...
Radioactivity least of their problems (Score:2, Funny)
oh. the book isn't real is it?
Aha! (Score:5, Funny)
Get yours now! (Score:4, Funny)
Not again. (Score:3, Insightful)
There are a lot of alarmists in the area that like to point at things like this and jump up and down and make a whole lot of noise. Granted, there is likely some valid scientific proof to this warning (because they probably wouldn't have issued it if there weren't), but that's all that this is. It's just a reminder to the crews that are working in the area to be careful--they're still allowed down there to clean up if they like.
This is a pretty regular thing for the area. The press gets wind of some sort of memo and the whole thing gets blown out of proportion. Things that should really only be semi-major events (like the Wen-Ho Lee case, for example) get turned into media circuses.
I understand the need for caution and scrutiny but seriously, people, let's keep it appropriate.
This memo is just a warning. It may come from a big, bad, government entity with some secret sleazy conspiracy agenda out to poison our kids or drug the masses or keep the real truth from getting out, but it also comes from an organization staffed with many of my good friends--people that I trust to oversee this type of work and set off alarms if something really bad is going on.
I'd recommend traveling to D.C. if you want to read between the lines.
Re:Not again. (Score:2)
Wen-Ho Lee sould have been a major case, but the press got hold of the wrong bit: why were US federal agents able to abuse their powers to try and "get" someone long after it became obvious the agents had cocked up? Why are they being offerred more powers?
Re:Not again. (Score:2, Insightful)
just remember, for every one "Memo" that gets blown out of proportion, there are at least ten that are being covered up.
Re:Not again. (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm a native New Mexican expatriated in hostile, relentlessly right-wing Texas (but in the oasis of Austin). I'm not sympathetic even the tiniest bit to the nuclear alarmists in northern New Mexico. CCNA's bullshit just infuriates me more than most things, actually. (When I was there last fall, I heard on their little news show on KUNM a story about low-level contaminated stuff recycled into materials incorporated into consumer items and they provided no scientific context whatsoever. I actually shouted at the radio.) I've known many people that worked at LANL (and Sandia), and I know some that still work there.
Having made it clear that I'm skeptical and hostile to nuclear fear-mongers, I think that there's reason for Los Alamosans to be mildly concerned about their risk. As a casual student of the history of the Manhattan Project, I know that a) the health danger of cumulative, long-term radioactive dosages was grossly underestimated at that time (and the acute danger was somewhat underestimated, too); and b) in the interests of expediance justified by national security concerns, they were notoriously careless about safety during and after the Project. Just take a look at Hanford and Rocky Flats for examples of just how careless the DOE has been. Or take note of what the supposedly ex-Oak Ridge employee writes above.
Also, my sister was a tumor registrar. She was not a registrar of that district, but she was a registrar of another district in a different state that included a DOE nuclear-related facility. It was her observation that there was clearly an unusual rate of cancers clustered around the facility, although it didn't reach the rigorous threshold of confident statistical significance. But it was not discussed, and the community remained unaware of any possible risk.
I also know that in the case of the cluster of brain tumors of ten years ago that the LANL and the DOE were shown to have been at the very least uncooperative and at the most actively dissembling.
I really think that people need to consider the implications of the fact that Los Alamos has a unique history. It was in its entirety a government installation on an urgent mission where civilian safety considerations didn't apply. It was only in the early sixties that it stopped being a "closed" city. LANL and the DOE is in the awkward position of worrying about a civilian apple-pie American population living in a city that was once wholly part of a government nuclear installation. Whether or not they were reasonably or unreasonably cavalier about safety in the past is irrelevant to the fact that, today, many people live alongside areas that were contaminated to a greater or lesser extent.
These trees are probably not of any real concern. But that doesn't mean that there's not some amount of significantly heightened risk in the area, nor that LANL and the DOE aren't always entirely forthcoming.
(Note: upon reviewing what I've written, I'm uncomfortable that I may give the impression that I'm sympathetic to the people that go berserk and totally irrational at the mention of the word "nuclear". I want to make the point that people are, in general, very very bad at risk analysis. Even though I write above that I believe there's some risk in Los Alamos, I want to make it clear that it is very likely that many people do things, thoughtlessly, on a daily basis that put them at considerably higher risk.)
Re:Not again. (Score:2)
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. As it is often described, given a random distribution of dots on a piece of paper you can find and circle little clusters that have no significance whatsoever. But that explanation exists to explain that everything that looks like a pattern is not. Where it is weak is that its artficiality ignores the possibiity of the existence of known factors that will affect the distribution. In this case, the cluster does not appear in isolation, it appears in conjuntion with a known cause. Yes, correlation is not causation. Everyone should repeat that phrase three times every day. But people should also repeat three times a day the sentence that starts this paragraph.
When you say "there was absolutely no evidence for it" your tone misrepresents the nature of rational enquiry and standards of evidence. Certainty is rare. What is more precise is that there was no conclusive evidence. The sample was too small to say with any confidence that it wasn't the case, as you put it, that a few people were unlucky. But given the context, it is foolish to dismiss the whole thing and assert that there's no risk. It is the sort of thing you reserve judgment upon and continue to gather more data.
Because of the hysterics of people like the CCNA, the Labs and the people of Los Alamos often feel under siege and, as a result, are defensive. This results in an irrational "dutiful" reflexive defense of LANL's and the DOE's stated positions. But the simple truth is that both organizations have a documented history of not always being truthful about these sorts of things. A wise person remains skeptical about anyone's pronouncements about the health risks (or lack thereof) associated with areas in and around Los Alamos.
And I'd like to again make the point that among health professionals, including, importantly, epidemiologists, there is a difference between what they say publicly and what they say privately. This is because people are irrational. They jump to conclusions. Health professionals are rightly very conservative about what they'll tell the public about this sort of thing because, as I said, people are poor at understanding probability and evaluating risk. But their own standard for watching and being concerned about something like this is not so conservative.
Re:Not again. (Score:2)
Chernobyl, polyploidy (Score:5, Informative)
A quick google search of chernobyl polyploidy tree [google.com] brings up a handful of good bibliographic links. I am not a biologist (nor do I have access to all of the references). I do suspect that there is a great deal of additional related information on the effects of the continued radiation on the environment.
Re:Chernobyl, polyploidy (Score:3, Informative)
The effects of long term exposure to low to moderate levels of radiation seem to be far less than receiving that same dosage all at once. In spite of that, the standards for radiation exposure tend to treat it as lifetime cumulative.
None of this, of course, will keep people from totally freaking every time they hear the word radiation. After all, the medical profession had to change the name for their imaging machines from "Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Imaging" to "Magnetic Resonance Imaging" because folks were scared of the word "nuclear!"
Re:Chernobyl, polyploidy (Score:3, Informative)
There have certainly been assertions of tens of thousands of deaths, but this was right after the event. It has failed to pan out. There were of course a number of deaths within the first month in the people who were exposed to high accute doses - limited to those who had worked on the fire.
As far as longer term effects over a larger area, take a look at your own reference on health effects - it says that only thyroid cancer has been found. Look at http://www.nea.fr/html/rp/chernobyl/c05.html for details.
EXTENSIVE studies have been done.
Animals do NOT show high concentrations of radioactivity in their flesh, although some show *trace* accumulations. Extensive studies of animals in the exclusion zone were done because they had the highest chronic radiation exposures. These tests included sensitive genetic tests looking for enhanced mutation rates. NO POSTIIVE RESULT WAS FOUND (other than the retracted paper). This comes from a recent survey article in Science magazine.
I think what Chernobyl will ultimately show is what many have long suspected: chronic low doses of radiation do *not* produce negative health effects in linear scaling with the known negative health effects of acute high doses. This is totally consistent with the Hiroshima and Nagasaki experience, although in those cases there was almost no chronic exposure there because there was no localized fallout from those two air burst explosions.
There are no studies that I am aware of that show negative effects on humans from low doses of radiation. There is at least one study that implies positive effects - the rate of lung cancer in the US is *inversely* proportional to the level of household radon (based on per-county death and radon statistics).
For both political and psychological reasons, the hazards of radiation exposure have been vastly overstressed, to the detriment of the public and the environment (due to its impact on nuclear power production). While it is entirely possible that low doses of radiation exposure produce very low increases in cancer incidence, the effect must be so tiny for it to have gone unmeasured.
The excess death estimates used by various agencies are based on linear extrapolations from people who received high acute doses. There is a fundamental rule on radiation exposure which is that the dose is linearly cumulative. There is, however, no evidence to support that rule at low levels.
BTW,,, as the longer term studies come in, there will *undoubtedly* be some statistically significant correlations (.95 probability level), if they test for enough possible consequences. This will happen if there is no effect at all, as the odds of a 1 in 20 significant result are pretty good if you look for more than 10 effects!
OMG BOB! (Score:2, Funny)
Jack : "What do you mean Bill?"
Bill : "That tree has 72 branches."
Jack : "So?"
Bill : "That one only has 71."
Jack : "Wow. Think the radiation did it?"
Ah who cares. Maybe it'll turn out to mean more paper for the rest of us!
Cut Um Down ... NOW!!!! (Score:5, Funny)
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Gozilla
Mothra
Attack of the Killer Tomatoes
Jerry Farwell
Learn from the past ... these trees can only hurt us!!
Re:Cut Um Down ... NOW!!!! (Score:2)
I just Biked through Bayo Canyon today (Score:4, Informative)
any place where there was at some time in its history a possible outflow of radioactive material, the plants will be contaminated. At least its not like hanford where the Tumbleweeds are sometimes radioactive.
But these are all well known. The reason they issued the warning was because the western bark beetle killed something on the order of 80% of the trees in that canyon's mouth in a single season. (No that's not an exageration) . Given the horrific forest fires that burned about 4% of the homes in town, there is a great deal of preventative tree cutting going on. far more than in any other rear with lots of new loggers. An they are cutting trees in areas they traditionally would not have access too. Hence the public warning.
now give it a rest. Hey want to know the good bit about radioactive contamination? you know exactly where it is and how to find it. Unlike for example, chemical contamination. The main thing that is different about los alamos and say your neighbor hood is that we actually know where the contamination is. PLus when we do have a spill it gets cleaned up. I recall a photo in the news of two guys in moon suits cleaning up a chemical spill of ethylene glycol in a parking lot (bottle dropped from fork lift). Front page news. Mean while that same day probably 500 people in chicago city flushed their car radiotors and dump a few thousand gallons of ethylene glycol into the river.
new stories like this suck
LANL is actually really good about this stuff... (Score:5, Informative)
I used to work at LANL for a short period of time, back in TA 35 (at the time, working on the SSC detectors). They're somewhat strict about their rules on radiation, and who can go in what areas. The building I was working in was T-shaped, and one of the top pieces of the T (the opposite one from my office) fell within the specified distance from an old tritium dump site. It was well posted that NOONE was to be in that wing without the proper training and badging. When my work required that I go down into that wing for a bit, I had to go to a different radiation safety class and get new radiation badges so that they could measure exposure. And that part of the building was only barely hot.
Having family that lived in Los Alamos for many years, and an uncle who worked at the labs as well, LANL was always very good about keeping people apprised of any possible issues. Los Alamos started off as a company town, and it still very much operates that way. If you don't work at the labs, you work for a business that supports the people who work for the labs. Everyone knows plenty of people who work there, and the town and the labs are very much dependant on each other.
-Todd
Worry About Old Buildings Instead (Score:2, Informative)
Who cares about trees? The buildings worry me. In the USA, we do know that there are many buildings that are probably contaminated and are sitting in company and government inventories, and are also in an abandoned state. Like all those factories rusting away in the Midwest, the true costs of owning them won't become apparent until the cleanup must occur. And this doesn't encompass the full scope of the problem on military sites. Try finding out about their hazardous waste problems. What we the public do know is a result of conscience, luck, closings and re-use. Sometimes a military man gets a conscience; a reporter gets lucky; or a site is torn up and exposed during closure or transfer of ownership. Then we can get a glimpse at what it Really Going On there.
And people worry about Yucca Mountain. We've tiny Yuccas -- Yuccatesimals? Microyuccas? -- in too many locations to allow Yucca to become a preponderance of worry for us.
Funny stuff (Score:4, Flamebait)
I think people would freak out if they realized how careless the gov't has been with nuclear waste.
For instance, the underground tanks they stored certain types of waste in were set up in a series. When tank one fills up, it spills over into tank two. When tank two fills up, it spills over into tank three. When tank four fills up, it spills over into the ground.
Oh, and the tanks were only meant to be used for 20 or so years and they've been used for more than twice that.
Then there's the waste that's being stored in what amounts to coffee cans.
This is all right next to the Columbia River incidently. Want a glass of water?
a greater outrage still (Score:3, Insightful)
Spening public money is not easy to do. The greatest threats must be fixed first, but there's a huge difference between public perception of threats and reality. Studies on waste sites have been made and there are priority lists. Then some loud mouth comes along and asks you if you want a glass of water. Uggg, the long chain of reasoning and risk assesment goes out the window.
Do me a favor and help the folks monitoring water quality. When you see an adverse trend then you can smugly say, "I told you so," and propose ways to fix the problem. Alamism hurts everyone.
Environmentalists... (Score:3, Funny)
Doubt that would work in the places that really matter, though - Asian deforesters probably don't care.
boyscout field trip. (Score:5, Interesting)
Back in the bad old days, there were tests done using mock-up weapons equipped with DEPLETED uranium (U-238). The experiments consisted of a fairly authentic weapon with a real primary (the high explosive part which "squishes" the fissionable materals together.)
The weapons did NOT have real uranium, rather U-238 (the stuff they use on armor piercing shells.) When they detonated the mock-up, the weapons usually blew all apart throwing chunks of U-238 all around the country-side.
My dear old dad, being a wise-ass, took us out with several geiger-counters looking for the U-238.
As I recall, we found a rock which seemed "hot", we began digging under the rock, getting closer and closer to the source of what seemed to be setting off the counters when my dad told us to stop. Not because of the radiation, rather the damn rock was likely to roll over and crush the lot of us.
He ended our field trip by letting us push the rock over into the hole we had excavated; great fun.
Re:boyscout field trip. (Score:3, Funny)
Wait! I saw this episode! (Score:2, Funny)
If I remember correctly, some scientists will develop an airborne spray to stop them.
From a Los Alamosan (Score:2, Interesting)
The lab (LANL) has fenced off a few areas, but I do trust that the canyon is generally safe. I bet spokesman Jim Rickman is basically telling the facts straight, too. He's a good man.
Moral of the story: this isn't really news. Look at how small the story on the local TV station is. This is less news than the time the garbage dump radiation detectors got set off (by the poop of a cat undergoing anti-cancer radiation treatments, not by the lab).
Oh, and the high tritium levels in the water must make it taste so clean and fresh.
Gives me an opertunity to ask... (Score:2)
How long does an area stay "hot" after a nuke goes off?
Examples:
How long after Aug 6 1945 was Hiroshima safe from a radiation standpoint?
How long until areas that had LOTS of bombs dropped on them be safe?
What about more modern bombs. If one were to take a top of the line bomb from the US and detonate it, how long until the area would be safe for humans again?
Also, what does one do if a nuke goes off anywhere near them, other then kiss their ass goodbye? What can you do to avoid radiation poison? I always thought the key was to stay away from metal since that becomes contaminated quickly, but hell if I know.
Blame the movie Sum of all Fears for this curiosity. To ruin it for you, when the nuke goes off and it shows this big shockwave, I figured anything that gets hit by that is going to be contaminated. In my head this means you are going to get cancer sometime soon.
Also, slightly related, can someone explain the EMP to me? I thought Sum of all Fears really fucked that one up but some people have said the EMP is really weak and doesnt travel very far. In another movie, Broken Arrow, the EMP goes out for Miles and Miles. In True Lies, they land the planes and shit before the nuke goes off for which I assume was to avoid an EMP related crash.
Oh, assume all detonations are ground detonations, but if you know the answer for atmosphere that would be cool too but how high up?
Re:Gives me an opertunity to ask... (Score:4, Informative)
Blame the movie Sum of all Fears for this curiosity. To ruin it for you, when the nuke goes off and it shows this big shockwave, I figured anything that gets hit by that is going to be contaminated. In my head this means you are going to get cancer sometime soon.
No, the shockwave is jsut a normal shockwave, nothing special about it. The radioactive fallout is more caused by dust and other particles being sucked into the core of the explosion after this shockwave has passed.
Also, slightly related, can someone explain the EMP to me? I thought Sum of all Fears really fucked that one up but some people have said the EMP is really weak and doesnt travel very far. In another movie, Broken Arrow, the EMP goes out for Miles and Miles. In True Lies, they land the planes and shit before the nuke goes off for which I assume was to avoid an EMP related crash.
Sum of All Fears actually got it more right than any other film. EMPs do not occur for ground detonations at all, they are an effect of detonating a nuclear device high in the atmosphere (ionosphere springs to mind, but im not certain). Broken Arrow got it totally wrong, there would have been no EMP from a underground explosion. Again, in True Lies, either they got it wrong, or they were landing the planes because of the shockwave.
Hope that helps.
Re:Gives me an opertunity to ask... (Score:2)
If you could not tell from my post where I jive about movies and pointless shit, im not *that* into it so if it were dumbed down Id be happy
I may just read this and be even more happy tho
A clear sign of past stupidity (Score:2, Insightful)
Just Out of Curiousity: (Score:2)
As I recall, the radioactive cloud apparently covered the entire northwestern European continent, but was almost ridiculously downplayed in the US (sorry, if contamination is enough to quarantine planes and kill reindeer herds, I doubt it drops to 0 with just over a day's travel in the jetstream).
Just wondering since we're on the subject of radiation, the US itself is largely contaminated with fallout from the bomb tests, as was recently uncovered over the last few years.
Re:Just Out of Curiousity: (Score:2)
Good idea for enviromentalist? (Score:2)
Re:IN SOVIET RUSSIA (Score:2)
2. ???
3. Profit!
I think I actually have an answer for #2...
2. Make glow in the dark paper...