15 kilos of depleted uranium missing UK

[nomatrix]

Daily Record U.K.

"A WHITE van loaded with nuclear waste capable of being used to make a terrorist "dirty-bomb" has been stolen.
A nationwide hunt was launched after the van containing 15 kilos of depleted uranium was snatched.
A secret police memo warns: "This material may become radioactive if ignited ... vehicle must not be approached by police."
All police forces in the UK, including the eight in Scotland, have been alerted to keep a lookout for the van, a T-reg Citroen Berlingo.
The intelligence service MI5 and defence chiefs have been alerted.

"There have been around 180 cases of terrorists trying to smuggle radioactive material since 1993, most of it depleted uranium, known as U-238."

http://www.sundaymail.co.uk/news/page.cfm?objectid=13171465&method=full&siteid=86024

[Atlant]

1. Don't worry...

Don't worry; they can replace it with the (literally) TONS
of it that we've left lying around the Middle East.

(It's also an indicator of how well people understand the technical
aspects of this that they can say "This material may become radioactive
if ignited". No physicists in THAT guy's family, I guess.)

Atlant

[nomatrix]

2. Any of this "news" published anywhere?

I did know....

"The substance - which is used to make shells and other ammunition - has been blamed for causing illness among hundreds of Gulf War veterans and civilians in Iraq."
and
"Last night, depleted uranium expert Professor Malcolm Hooper said: "Terrorists would want to obtain this. Our government and the United States have warned it could be used in a terror attack."


I didn't know....

"This material may become radioactive if ignited"

or

"There have been around 180 cases of terrorists trying to smuggle radioactive material since 1993, most of it depleted uranium, known as U-238."

[priller]

3. But the Pentagon said it's harmless

They've said over and over and over again that all the reports and fears over the TONS of DU the US has deposited in Iraq and Afghanistan are overblown.

Now they're trying to tell us terrorists can use the stuff to make "dirty bombs" and such?

They can't have it both ways. Either it's dangerous or it's not.

[nomatrix]

4. Anyone remember nuclear weapons testing?

"Press releases from the Atomic Energy Commission, stated plainly that fallout did not constitute a serious hazard outside the test area."
THE DAY WE BOMBED UTAH BY JOHN G. FULLER 1984,

"tells how the government and its hired scientists altered or totally suppressed all evidence of guilt in continuing bomb tests and subsequent court trials and invesstigations until the facts at lasts were slowly brought to light by those who refused to let the case die with the victims."

"tells of government representatives who assured a highly conservative, staunchly patriotic local population tat there was no danger at all from the fallout even when newborn lambs emerged deformed and sheep began to die in the thousands"

"a stinging indictment of government callousness and willingness to sacrifice the safety and lives of American citizens in the supposed interest of national security"

Once read, you will never trust the gov't again for any reliable information that involves consequences to their actions.

[nomatrix]

5. DU study by a nuclear scientist

http://www.antenna.nl/~wise/uranium/dgvd.html

Contamination of Persian Gulf War Veterans and Others by Depleted Uranium
by Leonard A. Dietz

"The U.S. military and its representatives claim that DU munitions are safe, but they have not publicly addressed health and safety issues that apply after DU munitions have been fired. Apparently the official view is that in a combat situation it is acceptable for unprotected personnel to be exposed to the combustion products of fired DU munitions and assume any health risks involved."

"We note the astonishingly high incidence of serious birth defects in families of Gulf War veterans in the State of Mississippi."

"We mention how commonly used DU flight control counterweights in aircraft and DU munitions can burn in intense fires and produce dangerous concentrations of airborne DU aerosol particles that can be inhaled and ingested."

[nomatrix]

7. U.N. found DU to be WMD

Efforts by the US/UK to keep depleted uranium off the agenda of the UN Sub-Commission on Protection and Promotion of Human Rights failed this August (2002) as the Sub-Commission clearly decided that depleted uranuim weaponry qualify as weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and authorized a prominent member, Justice Y. Sik Yuen (Mauritius) to prepare a study on the topic.

The UK member of the Sub-Commisson tried to have depleted uranium weaponry deleted from the study, which had been authorized earlier by the Sub-Commission, arguing that DU weaponry are not WMD, but her proposed amendments and a substitute resolution were defeated, drawing only two votes -- hers and the vote of the member from Norway.

The debate as well as the outcome reinforces the claim made by Karen Parker and supported by a clear majority of international experts --including 23 of the 26 members of the Sub-Commission -- that DU is already banned because it is incompatible with existing humanitarian law and qualifies as WMD. (The American member was chair and did not vote, but according to eyewitnesses allowed the Norwegian member to speak beyond the limits usually allocated for such debates.)

The vote to study weapons of mass destruction including DU is the latest success of UN non-governmental organizations (NGOs), who, beginning in 1996, started a campaign for a strong condemnation of both DU and sanctions. In 1996 attorney Karen Parker, Margarita Papendreou, Dr. Beatrice Boctor, Philippa Winkler and Dr. Gorst Gunther (all representing International Educational Development/ Humanitarian Law Project (IED/HLP)) made a two prong charge against both DU and sanctions at that year's session of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights.

[Loonman]

6. I can't remember the name of the John Wayne movie...

...that was filmed around a test area in Nevada, but all the actors involved in it got cancer later in life.

[GayboyBilly]

8. Stop and think

This could be part of the WMDS the find in Iraq. I wouldn't put it past them.

[nomatrix]

9. The Conqueror

"All four superstars-John Wayne, Susan Hayward, Dick Powell and Agnes Morehead subsequently died of cancer, and nearly 100 members of the cast and crew contracted cancer and half of them also died." As of 1984.
from the
Day the Bombed Utah
by John G. Fuller

[nomatrix]

10. Public Information on Dirty Bombs

The following question was answered by an expert in the appropriate field:

Q: With all the talk about the effects of a dirty bomb, I am curious about how the contamination spreads from the original radioactive particle to, say, my driveway. If the original energy is gamma, how would that differ? That is, what is the process that transfers the radioactivity and what needs to be done to clean the affected area?

A: Actually, the radioactive particles ARE the contamination. When they settle out of the air onto your driveway, they are causing your driveway to become contaminated and, if you find a way to remove them, you are decontaminating your driveway.


There are three basic kinds of radiation: alpha, beta, and gamma. The major isotopes of concern are cobalt-60, cesium-137, and iridium-192, and they all give off gamma radiation. However, if someone used strontium-90, it gives off beta radiation, and uranium (such as depleted uranium) emits alpha particles.


What happens with a dirty bomb is that someone would pack some radioactive materials around an explosive device and use the explosives to blow the radioactive materials into the air. When they settle out on the ground or buildings, they cause the contamination. Once there, they must be removed to decontaminate your driveway or house, and you do this by cleaning them with water or by scrubbing them. However, whatever you clean up with will, itself, become contaminated, so you must treat the scrub brush or the wash water as radioactive. So cleanup is not necessarily an easy process.


I would expect that, in the event of a dirty bomb attack, the government will give instructions as to the best way to clean up and what to do with the contaminated decontamination equipment. Hopefully, though, there will not be such an attack.


You might be interested in the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Fact Sheet on Dirty Bombs.

http://hps.org/publicinformation/ate/q2337.html

[nomatrix]

11. With all the news.....

did our terror level change?

[nomatrix]

12. Remember Magazine Cover

It had a picture of a Gulf War Veteran holding his son, born with severe birth defects. I have it somewhere.


DU Contaminated with Plutonium and Neptunium

The uranium hexafluoride that the US government store at Paducah, Kentucky could be contaminated with Plutonium and Neptunium. This could be the most worrying problem to date. Plutonium and Neptunium and 'Transuranics,' that is they are larger in atomic number that uranium. All transuranics are very radioactive and very dangerous even in small quantities.
This is the same stockpile that the Department of Energy plans to give away for commercial uses, including depleted uranium ammunition.

http://www.cadu.org.uk/news/3.htm

[newyawker99]

13. Hi nomatrix!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast: