Slashdot Mirror

What are you talking about? Need a citation. The original bombs were inefficient and produced more radioactive material that was embedded into everything.

This would be an Hydrogen bomb. It would have less radioactive material to blanket everything.

You need to go live on Rongelap and make certain you live on only food grown there.

Your clean Hydrogen bomb the Castle Bravo test, was 15 megatons of pure nuclear orgasm. http://www.ctbto.org/specials/... It really didn't seem to be all that clean though After rendering Bikini and then Rongelap uninhabitable, and killing a sailor and sickening others on the ironically named Lucky Dragon when the radioactive plume drifted over them.

Bikini is going to be a long time uninhabitable. https://www.sciencenews.org/ar...

Rongelap? Perhaps if no one eats any food raised or grown there.

You are starting with a relatively small number of people, probably better to think of it as a percentage

In the short term:
"A number of the 64 inhabitants of Rongelap experienced immediate radiation sickness including vomiting, skin damage and hair loss. By the time they were evacuated from the area two days after the detonation of Castle Bravo, some of the islanders had received 175 rads (See Chart 2) from gamma radiation and 160 rads from I-131"
http://www.ctbto.org/nuclear-t...

In the long term:
"We estimate that the nuclear testing program in the Marshall Islands will cause about 500 additional cancer cases among Marshallese exposed during the years 1946-1958, about a 9% increase over the number of cancers expected in the absence of exposure to regional fallout."
http://marshall.csu.edu.au/Mar...

So, you are probably saying, wow, just over 500 people affected, pretty small number if you consider Bhopal and Chernobyl
But if you consider that the population of the islands was 10,000 at the time, then that is 5% of their population, which is significant

There is also the persistent presence of isotopes that raise the expectation of cancer for all people to 9% over people not from the Marshall islands

They certainly have a legitimate beef with the government, whether they can leverage that to change global policy is another thing.

We would probably not be having this conversation if 5% of the general population had been exposed to isotopes that had caused cancer
I suppose that it is a matter of perspective

Undeniably so, but isn't it too late for that already, looking at this animated timeline of nuclear tests between 1945 and 1998. One wonders how the planet is still alive.

Radionuclides were detected in 2013, and 2006.

North Korea may have taken extra precautions to prevent their tests from releasing radionuclides, in order to conceal the nature of their fission devices (Pu-239 vs U-235, or possibly other isotopes) -- and thus, conceal & protect the supply chain for their fissile material.

Furthermore, don't let the low explosive yields fool you: NK is likely testing the compact trigger for full-blown, fission-fusion-fission thermonuclear devices -- whose explosive yield could be up to several hundred kilotons.

Radionuclides were detected in 2013, and 2006.

North Korea may have taken extra precautions to prevent their tests from releasing radionuclides, in order to conceal the nature of their fission devices (Pu-239 vs U-235, or possibly other isotopes) -- and thus, conceal & protect the supply chain for their fissile material.

Furthermore, don't let the low explosive yields fool you: NK is likely testing the compact trigger for full-blown, fission-fusion-fission thermonuclear devices -- whose explosive yield could be up to several hundred kilotons.

How many 20 megaton bombs have been used,

Not sure. Thousands of nuclear bombs have been exploded. (about 2055 of 'em! http://www.ctbto.org/specials/1945-1998-by-isao-hashimoto/) How many of them were in the 20 megaton range? Not many.

and how many bunkers would withstand one?

those that were designed to do that.

This work actually measured Total Electron Content, not electron density (a related, but different, phenomenon).

Maps of vertical and slant atmospheric electron density over the U.S. are here.

One done in USA and the other a day later in Japan AT THE BEGINNING OF THE INCIDENT - and then extrapolated that over 14 days until they had amounts close or over those in Chernobyl.

http://newsroom.ctbto.org/
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,14938445,00.html

"The estimated source terms for iodine-131 are very constant, namely 1.3 x 10^17 becquerels per day for the first two days (US station) and 1.2 x 10^17 becquerels per day for the third day (Japan)," the institute said in a German-language statement posted on Wednesday on its website.

"For cesium-137 measurements, (the US station) measured 5 x 10^15 becquerels, close, while Japan had much more cesium in its air. On this day, we estimate a source term of about 4 x 10^16."

If they keep counting long enough they'll top Hiroshima as well. Then again, so will my room on the other side of the planet.

Wanna bet the author of this story is a "green scientist" ?

With electrophysiology as a specialty I presume.

Search Results:
Sort by: relevance|date Refine by: Subject Area

Health (437)
Life (126)
Environment (93)
Science in Society (82)
Opinion (25)
Tech (12)
Physics & Math (8)
Short Sharp Science Blog (7)

Refined by:
Author(s): "Debora MacKenzie"

As for the article... Whenever someone says something like "per day" and doesn't say how many days would that be - take that with a LARGE grain of salt. Iodized, if you like.

In this case... 1.2 to 1.3 × 10^17 becquerels of iodine-131 per day in Fukushima seem like a lot, particularly compared to Chernobyl's "1.76 × 10^18 becquerels of iodine-131" FOR WHOLE 10 DAYS IT BURNED.
Holy SHIT! Fukushima has been "on" since March 11th! That would mean that it is somewhere around 1.68 - 1.82 × 10^18 becquerels of iodine-131 by now!
THAT IS MORE THAN CHERNOBYL! QUICK! EVERYONE! PAAAANIIIC!!!

Except... From the site of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization mentioned in the article as the source of data:

“The estimated source terms for iodine-131 are very constant, namely 1.3 x 10^17 becquerels per day for the first two days (US station) and 1.2 x 10^17 becquerels per day for the third day (Japan),” the institute said in a German-language statement posted on Wednesday on its website.

“For cesium-137 measurements, (the US station) measured 5 x 10^15 becquerels, close, while Japan had much more cesium in its air. On this day, we estimate a source term of about 4 x 10^16.”

Note that the level measured IN JAPAN on the third day is lower than the level measured IN THE USA on the second day.
As in - readings are getting MUCH LOWER. And, it is the statistic for ONLY TWO DAYS at the beginning of the Fukushima incident. And we all know what they say about extrapolations.
Particularly the ones done from only two points.

Also, the Deutsche Welle article describes the whole "how many Chernobyls is that" thing a bit more conservatively as "at 20 percent of Chernobyl for iodine, and 20-60 percent of Chernobyl for cesium".

I saw this the other day. I think it helps put the two atomic bomb attacks into perspective, given that from 1945-1998 there were over 2,000 nuclear detonations. http://www.ctbto.org/specials/1945-1998-by-isao-hashimoto/

I totally agree. The reason that nuclear waste is a problem at all is self-imposed, thanks to the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. Unfortunately, the process that takes "waste" and removes the spent material is the same proces that could be used to refine material for nuclear weaponry. If we can get society to move past the weaponization issue, and frame the spent fuel processing on "recycling", "renewable fuel" or some such, we might be able to get nuclear energy out of its rut.

There is more than enough "proper" seismic equipment out there generating copious amounts of quality seismic data. In fact, the data from the CTBTO will be used for tsunami warning. The problem is not data--the problem is in the analysis of the data and the dissemination of the warning. I am quite skeptical that the data from this technique will not be suitable for tsunami warnings.

"still b-2 stealth bombers"

Heh. You are funny. There are like a total of 21 B-2's and they take forever to get to a target. The U.S. is still mostly depending on around 336 Trident missiles launched from submarines and 500 relatively ancient Minuteman III's launched from silo's.

The delivery vehicles are being constantly upgraded, and they are still easy to test so they are not nearly the longevity problem the warheads are.

This is a pretty disturbing development in a lot of ways, especially since fairly recently the Bush administration was planning to develop new classes of nuclear weapons, especially bunker busters for use on bunkers and cave complexes, and they were seriously talking about using them in conventional conflicts, though Congress put their foot down in favor of this instead.

The U.S. also isn't supposed to test new warheads under the comprehensive test ban treaty:

1. Each State Party undertakes not to carry out any nuclear weapon test explosion or any other nuclear explosion, and to prohibit and prevent any such nuclear explosion at any place under its jurisdiction or control.

2. Each State Party undertakes, furthermore, to refrain from causing, encouraging, or in any way participating in the carrying out of any nuclear weapon test explosion or any other nuclear explosion.

This leaves one to wonder how the U.S. is going to deploy new warheads without tearing up this treaty it signed. You can go quite a ways with computer simulations but I can't really see the U.S. relying on a new warhead design that hasn't actually been test fired.

This new deployment also runs counter to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty which states the nuclear states are to "undertake effective measures in the direction of nuclear disarmament", "facilitate the cessation of manufacture of nuclear weapons", and "the elimination from national arsenals of nuclear weapons". The U.S. really is a major hypocrite when it tries to enforce this treaty on Iran and Iraq since it ignores most of the parts referring to the obligations of the nuclear powers that signed it. In my book either the U.S. withdraws from it or adheres to it. Demanding states like Iran adhere to it in every detail while the U.S. ignores its obligations does in fact make it a pretty hollow treaty.

For example the U.S. absolutely isn't supposed to transfer fissile material to states which haven't signed the treaty, and especially not to states which have nuclear weapons. The U.S. did exactly that recently when it signed a deal to sell fissile material to India for commerical purposes which probably frees up their existing stockpiles for weapons production.

The U.S. has also for years placed B61 tactical nukes within easy reach of NATO partners, Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Turkey. It hadn't actually given them to them but had given them all the expertise necessary to deliver them and would transfer them to these countries in the event of a World War. It may not be a violation in fact but is one in spirit.

The treaty also echoes the U.N. charter and states:

"states must refrain from in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any State"

The U.S. most definitely violated this when it invaded Iraq without a U.N. mandate, and when it threatens to do the same to Iran. This is why Kofi Annan referred to Iraq as an "illegal" war.

Well, if the UN can manage CEB, CTBTO, ECA, ECE, ECLAC, ESCAP, ESCWA, FAO, UNCTAD, HLCM, MA HREF="http://ceb.unsystem.org/hlcp/default.htm">HL CP, IACSD, IANWGE, IAPSO, and about 5 times as many more, I think they can handle one more. :)

UN's record isn't that great IMHO

Oh really? Of the organizations I listed (in alphabetical order), how many are bloated and overbudget? How many have involved scandal of any kind? How many have been largely ineffective? Etc?

Honestly, I think that this is just going to turn into a big OFF-bashing thread.

To put this in an interesting context, if I'm not mistaken (I'm not sure if this is the exact one) this is the same Universal Declaration that the United States refused to ratify because it didn't allow them to execute people under 18.
Hell, even China agreed not to do that by ratifying it, and they're easily one of the most (if not THE most) brutal and oppressive regimes in existence. So... the next time you hear a U.S. government official extolling the virtues of UN multilateralism, recall both this and also the U.S's refusal to ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.