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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.
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.
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:
"Jamie... I'm glowing!"
"Well there's your problem! I'd say that's Myth Confirmed!"
"That's all well and good for you but I look like a dead Jedi Knight now! Although that's pretty cool!"
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..."
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?
Thought you might like this from Troubled Lands The Legacy of Soviet Environmental Destruction by D. J. Peterson
http://www.rand.org/pubs/comme...
(Chapter 5)
"For example, in the town of Sillamae in northeastern Estonia, nearly
300 children attending two kindergartens suffered a loss of hair in 1989.
When the story first broke in March of that year, the Soviet press agency,
TASS, reported that specialists initially had suspected the cause to be
natural radioactivity emanating from local shale deposits. Subsequent
tests, however, revealed that background radiation in the town was
normal. After months of speculation and controversy, the former director
of the Baltiets enterprise, a local defense industry, revealed that his com-
pany had dumped radioactive wastes in the town. The two kinder-
gartens were built over the dump, separated from it by only a thin layer
of sand."
... 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.
"As long as no one is ingesting or inhaling particles it shouldn't be a problem."
Easy solution. Just hold your breath and don't eat or drink anything while on the island... people are such wimps.
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
Though the current system here in the US resembles something Mussolini would setup...
google "32 trillion offshore needs IRS attention"