ExposureBlog

There’s not much toxic or nuke exposure portrayed on television.  The one’s that got it absolutely right–The Day After and Special Bulletin come to mind–are are usually so right that it scares everyone out of watching them.  Which, sociologically speaking, is probably worth talking about—but some other time.  This post is just going to set the stage a little bit, as it were. 

Back in 1989 when I was in the then-USSR, officials there told me that The Day After was instrumental in forming Gorbachev’s position vis a vis the U.S.  As for Special Bulletin, if you want to know what terrorists can really do with even a small nuke, this is your film.  The writer and director should have been given emmys for this one.

Maybe they did get emmys, I forgot.  Anyhow, Special Bulletin was written by Marshall Herskovitz, who seemed to have a knack for getting the emotions right in his screenplays.  Among his other projects, 1976’s Family and 1987’s Thirtysomething.  Special Bulletin was directed by Herskovitz’ pal Edward Zwick who had a hand in the aforementioned Herskovitz projects as well as the great 1990’s series “My So-Called Life.”  It lasted one season.  Like Special Bulletin, maybe a little too realistic.

Which is perhaps why the current scriptwriters add that little dose of unreality to the program so that viewers will know that it’s all well, make believe.  Take that new CBS show scheduled for the fall lineup–Jericho.  From the press release it’s about the citizens of a small Kansas town who witness an explosion that resembles a nuclear test and because of it’s remote location (the town, not the explosion) the citizens have difficulty figuring out what to do next.  Sort of like Lost on the Great Plains. Or maybe not.

The fact is, I like CBS, mostly because Dan Rather and Fern Orenstein work there.  But, as a guy who knows a mushroom cloud when I see one, the cloud in the promo needs serious work.  It actually looks worse than the one in the really sensitive and too-cleverly-titled Desert Bloom, that old Jon Voight movie about coming-of-age and nuclear testing. 

But back to Jericho: there’s the problem with the terrain—there are mountains visible on the horizon.  I grew up in the Midwest and having spent a lot of time in Kansas I can assure you that Kansas is awesomely flat.  In fact, it has actually been mathematically proven to be flatter than a pancake.  I’ve been all across that state and I know of no place in KS where there are mountains as tall as are depicted in that promo.   Colorado, yes.  Southern California, suspiciously, yes.  Kansas?  No.

So, Fern–remember me?  I was the guy sitting next to you on the plane to San Fran—you were wearing that black MGM tee shirt. 

Place a call to CBS Television Marketing. Ask if the ”tweak” designer on that team has ever spent any time in the Midwest.

Jericho sounds like a great script, one of those shows that could turn out to be another Lost—but those mountains in that promo have got to go. 

From the air, the Divine Strake GZ doesn’t look like much–just barren desert.  A closer look (with a few marks on the photo) shows the location of the test tunnel.  Again, nothing spectacular.  Zooming out, however, we find that the site is only five miles from a shot crater that is still somewhat radioactive (about 150-250 microroentgens/hr)–even when measured using instruments placed 3 meters above the surface.  In my opinion, that’s probably close enough to the new GZ to warrant a real analysis of the Strake soil for radioisotopes.  Soil can easily migrate five miles, even where the winds don’t exceed 50 mph.

And now there is this–a map of the geology of Area 16 includes the famous Syncline Ridge.  It’s in blue—and it’s composed of what is called the Tippipah limestone formation.  According to an earlier chart, some of this area may include springs. 

I have been told that springs were mentioned in the doucments discussing earlier tests, particularly the Jan 18, 1968 Hupmobile Shot, but I’ve seen nothing in the Strake EA’s about them.  

The presence of springs may indicate the presence of an aquifer, and thus the possibility of contamination.  And of course, there may have been one there in 1968 and it has dried up since. 

Stay tuned.

Daniel W. Miles, a former physics professor at Dixie College in Utah offers another perspective on breathing radioactive dust.  Short version: the (presumably) typical Utah garden contains naturally-occurring radioactive materials, so breathing radioactive dust isn’t so bad. 

I have some problems with this view.  First of all, Miles compares his garden’s radioactivity to something that is still unknown—the radioactivity of the soon-to-be-generated dust cloud.  He’s comparing apples and oranges. . .er, actually—his radioactive tomatoes, cucumbers and squash with some unknown stuff from Area 16 of the Nevada Test Site.  And while I’m sure we could find thorium, uranium and radon in most places, I believe we’d be hard-pressed to find such isotopes as cesium-137, strontium-90, curium-242 and plutonium in our back yards.  Yet those radioisotopes are probably buried a few inches below the surface at Area sixteen’s ground zero. 

Dr. Miles may save money on the candles for his Halloween pumpkin, and good for him. But we still should identify those radioisotopes at Area 16 before we spread them around the country.

Maybe.  Stay tuned.

In an earlier post I noted that the feds (and Bechtel) had claimed Area 16 was free of radioactivity because no nuclear tests were detonated there.  I suggested that since nuclear tests had taken place less than 10 miles from the center of Area 16 that contamination was a real possibility. Then, I listed a few nuclear tests that were implicated:  Turk, Coulomb B, Kepler, Galileo, Shasta and Smoky.  If you click on the links you will see that the Defense Nuclear Agency’s own maps–these from the Plumbbob series–clearly show contamination of the Nevada Test Site west of the detonation points.  In many of the maps you will see the Nevada-California border.  Note that in most of these maps North does not necessarily point toward the top of the page.

Okay. So suppose Area 16 was contaminated in 1957.  That was almost 50 years ago.  Would the ground still be radioactive after all these years?

The answer is yes.  For example, the Hicks Table for shot Kepler, truncated version here, suggests that several radioisotopes—including cobalt-60, americium-241 and strontium-90 are still active after all these years.

And if these radioisotopes are in the soil at Area 16, they will likely be part of one very large dust cloud.

As a sometimes-litigation consultant, I have come to appreciate the work opposing counsels put into depositions and trial.  If there is a shred of positive evidence to support their side of the case, they will polish it until is shines like a 5000-watt beacon.  If there is a pinhole-sized irregularity in your conclusions they will turn it into the fatal flaw.  That’s their job.  What’s more, that’s good for you.  And good for the case–because it helps the truth become real.  The jury listens to both sides, decides whose side has the worst case, and votes for the other side.   That is exactly the way it should be and that’s the way it is.

Except, apparently when the government is involved.  The World Trade Centers fell in a cloud of dust—a toxic brew of asbestos, mercury (probably americium-241), PCBs and heaven-knows-what-else. Thousands of New Yorkers were exposed.   And yet in the five year span since that event, the EPA has never bothered to determine the quantitative concentration of the cloud, i.e. in terms of milligrams per cubic meter–even though such metrics form the standard for many regulatory agencies such as OSHA, NIOSH and EPA.  And even though people possibly have begun to die from that very exposure.

  Instead, the EPA apparently grabbed a professorload of “exposure experts” who never seemed to answer phone calls OR be able to divide mass by volume (though this is something that guys in the litigation field do all the time.)  Thus, no concentration value, no quantified exposure.  No quantified exposure, no evidence.  Reporters assigned to the hearings aren’t really good at math and science, but that’s okay.  They get the big picture.  And the big picture is, so it happens, painted by the EPA–who assures us there is some information that we really don’t actually need.

But that’s another post for another time.

But now, I’m seeing the same thing with Divine Strake the big ammonium nitrate and fuel oil explosion set for sometime in June at Area 16 at the Nevada Nuclear Test Site.  And the feds–albeit another branch–are doing it again. 

Here are the facts:  Seven hundred tons of ammonium nitrate/fuel oil will be detonated at Area 16 of the Nevada Test Site.  The soil at Area 16 probably is loaded with radioactive elements such as cesium-137, strontium-90, plutonium and maybe even americium-241.  How do I know this?  Because the place was contaminated with above-ground nuclear tests such as those code-named Easy (1952), Turk (1955), Coulomb B(1957), Kepler and Smoky (1957)–and maybe others.  The contamination countours were mapped and published in a government document called DASA-1251.  You can see two of the maps here and here.

These tests were known to have produced long-lived radioactive elements. Thus, as any high school student would surmise, if these tests contaminated what is now Area 16, and if these same tests produced long-lived hot isotopes that are active for 50 years, then Area 16 is still hot.

The federal government claims that there are NO radioactive isotopes at the site because no atmospheric tests were detonated there. 

What they are not saying is that Area 16 is a mere eight miles from the ground zeroes of many of the 1957 nuclear tests.  Reporters were kept seven miles from ground zero so as to avoid contamination and exposure.

Eight miles is not a terribly great distance, considering that most of the aboveground tests occurring nearby produced debris clouds that reached 30,000 feet into the sky. 

In response to inquiries about safety, I have been informed that the federal response has been, in effect: “We monitored both sides of a road in Area 16 and we found nothing exceeding background radiation.” 

Anyone presenting that kind of lame excuse for evidence in a real civil courtroom would be devoured by opposing counsel.  I can imagine the questions:

• Did the area you sampled involve sites that would be entrained in the actual dust cloud?
• Did you use alpha detection apparatus, or did your managers just drive down the gravel road—steering with one hand while holding a Geiger counter out the window?
• Did you calibrate the instrument? (probably not)
• Do you know that alpha emitters—known carcinogens—can have their radiation occluded by a layer of dust?
• Did you use alpha detectors to detect radioisotopes such as americium-241?
• Did you actually sample the soil expected to be converted to dust in the detonation?
• Did you perform a kriging analysis (a geospatial sampling procedure that purportedly accurately represents the conditions of the site as a whole)?  If not, why not?
• Did you analyze the soil in order to catalog the radioisotopes that are still active in the blast zone?  If not, why not?
• If you did analyze the soil, what are your limits of detection?  Are they appropriate given the levels of activity that are expected to be present?
• Several prior ammonium nitrate-fuel oil explosions have been detonated by your agency.  Can you tell us what altitude was attained by the debris clouds?
• Did these debris clouds leave the test site?
• Did you track them at all, and if so, by what means?
• How do you plan to track the debris cloud from shot Divine Strake? Airplanes?
• Are offsite monitors equipped to properly detected and identify individual radioisotopes from this test?  NOT just gross beta, gamma or alpha.
• Can you tell us which offsite monitoring stations (if any) are equipped with a means to immediately determine alpha values?
• Are you willing to identify the personnel who will perform the offsite analysis?

Actually the last one was an easy shot: the EPA has a monitoring network, but the last time I looked (2003) the sites only checked for gross beta and gamma and not alpha—and they mail the samples to the EPA Lab in Montgomery, Alabama—there were only 50 sites in the U.S.—and most were staffed by volunteers.

When I asked the EPA representative for an opportunity to interview one of the volunteers in the Iowa lab, she refused.   So much for quality control. 

This eventually led me to suggest to the Department of Homeland Security that a terrorist organization could detonate a 1 kg block of the alpha-emitter am-241 at 20,000 ft altitude over western Wyoming—contaminate thousands of square miles of U.S. soil—and completely escape detection by the EPA system.  Another story, another post, another time.

Bottom line I: If the government “experts” played by the rules of even the most rural southern jurist, then the truth might surface a tad faster.

Bottom line II:  I have nothing against the Defense Threat Nuclear Agency testing bunker busters at various sites around the United States.  That sort of thing comes with the job classification; and they’re doing it, ultimately, to protect us, the American people.  I have no quarrel with the good men and women of the Defense Threat Nuclear Agency.

What I do find offensive is if they try to avoid or suppress evidence that would shed light on the full known consequences of their actions—i.e. qualitative assurances where quantitative values are required. Or hand-waving (”Bechtel said it was fine.”)  Specious arguments (”no above ground testing at Area 16–so it’s safe.”)  No passing the buck to some subcontractor (protected by the Feres doctrine.)  Stuff that would bring on scathing venom from even the most inexperienced trial lawyer if it were presented by his opposing counsel’s expert. 

In other words, Divine Strake is the sort of thing that could impact real people in the real world—therefore it should be held to real world standards—and not some reporter who got his job on the environment beat because no one else wanted it.

In civil litigation the experts have to play fair and tell the truth, because if they don’t they will surely be called on it—and their client will have a greater chance of losing. 

The very same criteria should apply to the feds and their faux nukes—even those–like this one–that are turbocharged with a barnload of fertilizer and fuel oil.

I had a chance to read the DOE’s pre-approval draft of a document titled  ”Large-Scale, Open-Air Exposive Detonation DIVINE STRAKE at the Nevada Test Site (November, 2005.) It can be found here.  The gist: DOE chose the Nevada Test Site for this bunker buster test because it was remote, secure and had limestone similar to what they would expect during combat operations against the current enemy (presumably Al Quieda.) 

The document dismisses the potential problem of radioisotopes in the soil with this:

“The U16b test bed was constructed in 1998, but it was never used for any type of nuclear testing activity.  Based upon this process knowledge, the aerial radiation surveys performed in the past by AMS (aerial measuring system), the current radiological control status of the area under the BN (Bechtel Nevada) radiation protection program, and the knowledge of the area from the NTS (National Test Site) Environmental Restoration (ER) program, NNSA/NSO (National Nuclear Security Administration)is confident that no radioactive contamination exists at U16b.”

In other words, it seems the NNSA’s opinion regarding site contamination is based  on the results of aerial measurement, ”knowledge of the area” from past remediation activity, and, well,  Bechtel’s word that site is safe.

Unfortunately, there are no sample results offered to back up this extraordinary claim.  In matters like this—as with all situations involving the possibility of contamination by substances—the claims must be backed up by numbers.  Qualitative assurances in cases like this are essentially meaningless.

Granted, Divine Strake is a relatively small test.  As the NNSA document notes, other non-nuclear explosions have been equal to or larger than the one scheduled for June.  Among them:

• Dice Throw–620 tons in 1979.
• Distant Runner–2,250 tons in 1981
• Mill Race–620 tons in 1982
• Direct course–609 tons in 1983
• Minor Scale–4,744 tons in 1985
• Misty Picture–4,685 tons in 1987
• Misers Gold–2,445 tons in 1989
• Distant Image–2,440 tons in 1991
• Unnamed shot at U12n—1,410 tons in 1993.

Unfortunately, the authors fail to tell us anything about the debris clouds formed from these detonations.  They may have been small—and if so, then the cloud from Divine Strake will likely not travel far.  But again, the authors give us no information on these shots.  How high did the clouds reach?  Ten feet?  Ten thousand?

Nuclear test code-named Danny Boy was detonated on March 5, 1962 at Test Area 18.  Danny Boy was a minor nuclear test—equivalent to only 400 tons of conventional explosive.  And, the device was buried under 110 ft of basalt.  However, it created a crater 214 ft wide by 62 ft deep and the debris cloud traveled past northern Minnesota and into Canada.

The Divine Strake test is not a nuclear test.  But it will be detonated at a site where contamination is known to have occurred.  According to the Defense Nuclear Agency’s DASA-1251, close-in fallout from shots Turk and Coulomb B spread contaminated much of the Nevada Test Site—including Area 16.  Other nuclear tests that may have contributed to close-in fallout include shots Kepler, Galileo, Fizeau and Smoky.  Fallout from these tests included long-lived radioisotopes, and unless the soil at Area 16 was somehow scrubbed, then the radioisotopes are probably still there. 

And if the debris from Divine Strake reaches the same altitude as the cloud from Danny Boy, then the radioisotopes in the soil at Area 16 will likely be transported to other parts of the United States.

Sometime between June 2 and June 23, the military will detonate about 700 tons of high explosive at the Nevada Test Site’s Area 16.  The Department of Energy has published an extensive document discussing this shot.  However, according to this map–from the DOE library and published in August, 2005, it appears that the soil in Area 16 has relatively high concentrations of plutonium. 

The Nevada Test Site is divided into rectangular-shaped areas, with Areas 12 and 15 representing the northeast corner of the NTS.  Interestingly, Area 16–where the shot is scheduled to be detonated–is adjacent to Area 1—both found at the dead center of the NTS.  Just east of Area 1 is Area 3.  According to the map, the center points of Area 3 is only 8 miles east-northeast of Area 16–a walking distance of about two hours.

No aboveground nuclear tests that have been detonated at Area 16, and there was only one burst that took place just a few miles due east at Area 1–the 12-kiloton Tumbler-Snapper Easy (May 7, 1952.)  According to my copy of DASA 1251 the plume from EASY extended due north—and not west toward Area 16.

There were, however, many above-ground tests that took place at Area 3: George, Annie (, Simon, Harry (, Apple 2, Moth, Hornet, Pascal A, Pascal B, Franklin, Coulomb A, Coulomb B, Flzeau and Galileo. 

The smaller devices detonated at Area 3 included: Colfax, Luna, Bernalillo, San Juan, Otero, Valencia, Humbolt, Catron, Rio Arriba and Chaves.

Most of the debris clouds from these shots drifted north and east, but the Coulomb B cloud traveled west, directly over Area 16.  Two other aboveground shots detonated from Area 3 also may have contaminated Area 16: the debris clouds from shots Fizeau and Galileo traveled northwest and may also have contaminated Area 16.

There were, in fact, some nuclear debris clouds that behaved so badly that they probably contaminated much of the entire Nevada Test Site.  Among this group were shot Turk (1955), and shots Kepler and Smoky (1957.)

While many radioisotopes decay to harmless (i.e. non-radioactive isotopes) within a few years, some last a long time.   According to the Hicks Tables several of the fallout components from the shots listed above are still active in appreciable quantities (i.e. >10E-8 microCuries/sq meter.)  Shot Smoky, for example produced radioisotopes Cobalt-60, Strontium-90, Yttrium-90, Cesium-137, and Europium-155 which are still active today.

I have not read DOE’s Divine Strake document yet.  I hope the document includes plans to either contain the still-radioactive debris onsite—or, if the cloud does somehow get offsite, plans and procedures to monitor for the radioisotopes that may spread across several states.

It’s been a busy several weeks since I’ve posted on the ExposureBlog. As I indicated on our sister site, TwoSixtyBlog, we’ve been constructing a nuclear (fallout) exposure database. With any luck it will be up and running on the< < http://www.260press.com>>site within a week or so.

As for exposure issues, I plan to include info about calculating exposure on toxic chems, radiation and issues that are associated with industrial hygiene and safety. Lots of info lately about the mold issues in New Orleans. I plan to look at that issue in a while.

Meantime, I’ll be crunching code trying to figure out CSS—the machinery behind WordPress. I’m a little amazed that books have been written about other Blog software, but not about WordPress—which is one of the more complicated Monster Magnets of the blogosphere.

Maybe, among the exposure stuff, I’ll throw in something about CSS and WordPress. We’ll see.