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Navy Won't Investigate Nuclear Pollution At San Francisco's Treasure Island
Lasrick writes "The Center for Investigative Reporting spent a year investigating whether San Francisco's Treasure Island is contaminated with radioactive material left over from the decades the island was a naval base. Treasure Island is being transferred into civilian hands, and the city of San Francisco has plans to turn it into a 'second downtown.' Despite the fact that radioactive debris has been found around the island, the Navy refuses to conduct testing that might show whether radiation cleanup should be started before development begins, Independent testing by CIR and others has found high levels of cesium 137 and other radioactive substances at several spots on the island, and by examining unclassified military documents, CIR has found that the history of the nuclear work done at Treasure Island and the lack of safety protocols at the time mean the contamination is most likely wide-spread. Complaints by current residents has only resulted in bureaucratic infighting among state health departments and the Navy."
Let the buyer beware, and be extra wary when the seller is the one responsible for enforcing the safety of sellers.
And Admiral... it is the Enterprise
get the mythbusters to test for it
If the area is going to end up paved, without wells or agriculture, then low level cesium contamination is beside the point.
When Los Alamos (of Plutonium era) was refurbished for civilian use, the walls were painted over with bright red paint, followed by white paint. The paint was adequate to block plutonium alphas and daughter betas. The rule for the buildings was "if you see red, call maintenance."
Don't take life too seriously; it isn't permanent.
Yeah, sounds about right.
So pick your (radioactive) poison.
I am Audience.
That's all. Move along.
The wind shifted
back in the fifties particles drifted
A wave set in motion
the Pacific Ocean
test of the hydrogen bomb
There from would come
too close to home
ships from the test
put to rest
and convalesce with heavily armed guard
in Hunter's Point shipyard
Heavy metal sandblast
Facemask
Deoxidize
Remove the radiation from the outside
a hazardous cargo
dumped into the harbor
went farther then that though
Sand from the blasting
made into sidewalks
played on by kids
that just got over chicken-pox
Glowing faces
All races
Hop-scrotch bare feet
on Geiger counter concrete
Mother prepares a fruit salad treat to eat
sprayed with messed up pesticides
none have been tested for health effects
on the side
Medical racist social statistics
Has everyday life become a health risk
Meanwhile, back in the backyard,
father lights-up a barbeque fire
and he sizzles hormone injected meat
on top of a toxic source of heat
He becomes light headed
as the toxins easily meet
with the lite beer in his head and
he glances to his portable television set
from his eyes he wipes the double vision sweat
visions of white supremacists
posing as right conservationists
holding an Aryan agrarian Woodstock
lead the stray sheep into the flock
hookin' em in with the music of flower power
change their energy into fire power
Medical racist social statistics
Has everyday life become a health risk
All of a sudden
acid rain falls from the sky
and gets into the nuclear family picnic pie
not to mention their Kool-Aid
The nuclear family sits down to lunch
They munch it down with acid rain punch
and they begin to hallucinate
disassociate
the pain in their bodies
from the pain in their minds
They go inside and remember a time
before the world went
completely blind
When people grew bald naturally
no mutations
unlike Skinheads
and chemo-therapy patients
Medical racist social statistics
Has everyday life become a health risk
--M. Franti/Spearhead
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
You have to read to just about the end to get this:
Has Adam Savage gained super powers after his exposure to radiation?
Jamie: "Okay, Adam jump off the top of the building!" ...
Jamie: "Nope... can't fly..."
If there's one thing this isn't, it's offtopic. This song actually addresses the specific topic we're discussing here.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
... all over again for those who lived through Love Canal.
dead man talking series; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZ2VpfUqRoo
I found out years later I lived pretty close to a superfund site. Not a happy discovery. Hmm, I wonder if there are any funds available if its govt?
It is telling that this news article, published in "The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists" contained zero quantitative radiation or dose rate information within its several thousand words. Lots of "He Said" stories but no numbers. Did the authors of the article labor under the false assumption that their intended audience was numerically illiterate or do they have nothing but unsubstantiated anecdotes?
Can't imagine anyone would ever think building on a toxic radioactive dump would be a good idea
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
And the Marines are just the Navy's policemen. Yea, yea.
Remember the Air Force used to be PART OF THE ARMY and the NAVY existed 100+ before the guys in blue. Also remember that the Navy flies too, only they use 1,000 foot long runways that float around and does just about EVERYTHING the guys in Blue can. The Air Force rarely uses anything under 6,000 foot, so who has the better pilots?
Ah, the old flame wars of old, BEFORE we had the internet, before we had FIDONET, before we even had modems and computers..
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
have you ever been a member of or in any way affiliated with the communist party
>Complaints by current residents has only resulted in bureaucratic infighting among state health departments and the Navy."
Complaints by current residents have...
Some mornings it's hardly worth chewing through the restraints to get out of bed.
I don't see any issues with them using the island. Cs-137 is pervasive as well as plutonium. As long as no one is ingesting or inhaling particles it shouldn't be a problem. I want to know just how "contaminated" this place is. If readings are a few CPM above background I wouldn't worry in the least.
The story stems for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, who have been nothing but scaremongers ever since the Cold War about nuclear destruction.
wtf, treasure island is fully populated and has complete infrastructure, seems like people have been living there for years already......I just looked at google maps. So wtf is everyone on about?
Part of Chatham dockyard (at which my father worked)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Mary's_Island,_Medway
was allegedly used to wash down the Royal Navy ships that had been to pacific nuclear tests when they came back in the 1950's & 1960's
Those were very dirty tests
http://www.nuclearveterans.com/breaking_news.html
Look into their recent Richmond CA HUD reporting. They sort of chose to ignore huge chunks of stuff in favor of sensationalism
... now the corporate sector is getting impatient that they can't profit off of it! Ridiculous.
The most cost efficient solution would be to just remove the highway exit leading to the island.
Build a new island if you want to build high-priced condos to continue to overpopulate San Francisco. Or let the corporations that will profit off of the condos actually pay to cleanup the island.
Would worker's government be the one who follows they own regulations and laws? Or would we call that a working government?
Since it's San Francisco, the planners probably think the nuclear radiation will help their quantum auras if they wave around new age crystals and hang them from the mirrors of their Toyota Priuses.
Was? Still is. Along with the whole state of New Jersey
Humans are radioactive too. The question is, how much? What are the numbers? Without that information, the article is 100% completely useless.
The state of California once proposed standards for formaldehyde levels that would have categorized human beings as dangerous carcinogens, because our bodies produce formaldehyde needed for certain body processes. With no numbers and no sense of scale, anything, even your own body van be made to sound scary.
These are some stupid corporations. Start selling the dirt in the middle east. Best case scenario: you'll make bank from selling it to stupid terrorists who think it will be useful for making dirty bombs (and it will be, for certain definitions of "dirty"). Worst case scenario, the government will decide maybe they SHOULD clean it up.
Except it was built for the World's Fair and intended to be re-purposed as an airport. The Navy base idea came later.
But hey, no reason to let facts get in the way of your knee-jerk response, right?
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
Also remember that the Navy flies too, only they use 1,000 foot long runways that float around and does just about EVERYTHING the guys in Blue can. The Air Force rarely uses anything under 6,000 foot, so who has the better pilots?
The Air Force does. The Navy has aviators, not pilots. ;)
And the ARMY has the flame throwers so they win Flame wars..
That's no lady, that's YOUR wife!
Stick around folks, I'm here all day!
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Contracts are already signed; it's not "impatience" when you've been sold the goods and told that, hey, turns out they might be more radioactive than permitted by state law.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
Radon is a problem that is prevalent all over the country. Quoting the EPA:
"Radon is a radioactive gas. It comes from the natural decay of uranium that is found in nearly all soils. It typically moves up through the ground to the air above and into your home through cracks and other holes in the foundation."
You also get a daily dose from cosmic rays, again quoting the EPA:
"Fortunately, Earth has an atmosphere that helps absorb and filter them out, which protects us from high doses of cosmic radiation. However, some radiation is able to make it through. The dose of cosmic radiation that you receive varies depending on the altitude of the area in which you live."
Currently we are enjoying a bath of man made radiation from all the bombs we have set off, all the nuclear plant leaks, improper handling of materials over the years, etc.
If the folks in charge in San Francisco aren't too concerned then I wouldn't be either. If memory serves they are about as green as you can get in that neck of the woods.
The Soviets had one of those. They need more help cleaning up their own nuclear waste sites.
Michael, Trevor or Franklin to clean it up in a submarine
Why would you even want the Navy investigating nuclear contamination if they are the ones who are responsible for it in the first place? Honestly, what do you expect them to find?
That's a bit like asking BP to determine if there is any oil contaminating the Gulf of Mexico or asking Union Carbide if there happens to be any toxic chemical pollution in Bhupal.
The Nuclear Regulation Commision is the agency that oversees radioactive material safety, have them do it.
"Piss off, you hand-wringing, liberal, enviromentalist weenies. Your federal government is all about privatizing profit and socializing expenses. You want it cleaned up? You pay for it."
Fancy that. The Navy does not need to give two shits about state laws, especially in backwards California.
I guess they figure that the radioactive material coming from Fukushima would
equalize it all given enough time and decided not to bother....
What most ppl don't realize is that the US taxpayer paid for this happen TWICE....
The 1st time for what this article is talking about, and the 2nd time when stuxnet
either caused or made worse the disaster in Fukushima.
http://www.nuc.berkeley.edu/no...
google "32 trillion offshore needs IRS attention"
It will just get hijacked like the unions did, just a different set of globalist gangsters.
Its funny how most of the governments of the world act like a state sponsored mafia.
The hits just keep coming...
Terrance Yeakey, MIchael Hastings, Andrew Breitbart, Karen Silkwood, Pat Tillman, etc etc...
google "32 trillion offshore needs IRS attention"
Well you know what old Vladimir said.
"The goal of socialism is communism" ~ Vladimir Lenin
google "32 trillion offshore needs IRS attention"
Though the current system here in the US resembles something Mussolini would setup...
google "32 trillion offshore needs IRS attention"
It was a Navy base starting in World War II, and then used for "Atomic Warfare Training" until the end of the cold war.
I'm guessing they're on about the crap disposal procedures they used in the 50's and 60's regarding chunks of radioactive material, as well as the procedures used to hose down the "USS Pandemonium" with radioactive shit (simulating a nice coat of nuclear fallout), and then clean it off.
It was all in TFA, in case you were curious.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
How about sending The Director of Sustainability for New York's MTA there. He thinks companies need to build in blighted downtown areas. Here's his chance.
Speaking of "ground water", I believe the island is susceptible to high tides now and it (the island) is not getting any higher. A recent study (http://www.bcdc.ca.gov/planning/climate_change/TreasureIslandStudy.pdf) used 55" as a plausible/high level for sea level rise (SLR) by 2100. It rose 8 inches in the last 100 years, according to the same study. Plus the island is isolated as far as public transportation - perhaps people are looking to build in a place near SF that most people have trouble getting to?
Seems like a poor choice for a place to invest in the long term, if it's going to be underwater.
When the Government gives something away or sells it, your due dilligence should be much more dilligent than usually due. If it really had any value the chances are someone's cronies would have had the first refusal, so if you really get a crack at it, it most likely has a negative value.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Not sure what your point is: The island was still built by the Army Corps of Engineers.
The Navy base idea came after Pearl Harbor, when the Navy needed an area to stage its ships before sending them out to war. They requested that San Francisco submit a purchase price. After San Francisco decided that the island was not for sale, the Navy seized it. They then traded Mills Field for the island. (Mills Field eventually became the San Francisco International Airport, which probably would not have fit under the Bay Bridge anyway!)
The city still got to hold its exposition, which is why the island was built. They then got land elsewhere for their airport. It's not like they got screwed, especially since most of the island creation and subsequent development cost was funded by New Deal funds (Works Public Administration and Public Works Administration). The rest was supported by exhibition funds and the local governments.
And keep in mind, that this was during WWII. The priorities were a little bit different then.
You think the government cared enough about Andrew Breitbart to kill him? That's hilarious.
Or did the evil government force him to drink like a fish and sniff cocaine into his 40s?
Pat Tillman... are you nuts... global gangsta's?
Ask your doc to increase you meds...
I've always enjoyed the bracketed indication of target domain behind links in discussion, I think it would be nice to implement this also for the main page. In some cases, wording indicates some inconspicous page and people tend to click links that actually lead to the pages like Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, which no self-respecting nerd should read (hint: If you can't include actual levels or link to the data you're not an Atomic Scientist but Alarmed Shill).
Troll 2.0 Fear my asocial networking!
Can't tell if this is sarcasm.
They feared that it could be used to suppress protest or support unpopular rule.
You could probably even defend it as performing a public service. As long as you keep it separate from your dispersal device until just before you want to trigger your "dirty bomb".
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
Remember the Air Force used to be PART OF THE ARMY
That's because planes are tanks that are really good at jumping.