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Potassium iodide distributors have a friend on Twitter:
A Twitter battle over the size of each "nuclear button" possessed by President Donald Trump and North Korea's Kim Jong-un has spiked sales of a drug that protects against radiation poisoning.
Troy Jones, who runs the website www.nukepills.com, said demand for potassium iodide soared last week, after Trump tweeted that he had a "much bigger & more powerful" button than Kim — a statement that raised new fears about an escalating threat of nuclear war. "On Jan. 2, I basically got in a month's supply of potassium iodide and I sold out in 48 hours," said Jones, 53, who is a top distributor of the drug in the United States. His Mooresville, N.C., firm sells all three types of the product approved by the Food and Drug Administration. No prescription is required.
In that two-day period, Jones said, he shipped about 140,000 doses of potassium iodide, also known as KI, which blocks the thyroid from absorbing radioactive iodine and protects against the risk of cancer. Without the tweet, he typically would have sent out about 8,400 doses to private individuals, he said. Jones also sells to government agencies, hospitals and universities, which aren't included in that count.
Alan Morris, president of the Williamsburg, Va.-based pharmaceutical firm Anbex Inc., which distributes potassium iodide, said he's seen a bump in demand, too. "We are a wonderful barometer of the level of anxiety in the country," said Morris.
Note: A comment on the article claims that Nukepills is massively overcharging for the substance.
(Score: 3, Informative) by frojack on Saturday January 13 2018, @09:00PM (4 children)
Those early tests all had greater yield than expected (or initially acknowledged).
Xrays and Neutrons have no problem traveling 30 miles.
He survived, did he not?
You've disproved your own argument.
For a 1 megaton bomb, which is 80 times larger than the bomb detonated over Hiroshima:
Source [sciencealert.com]
But again, a simple barrier between you and the blast takes out almost all of the initial heat. Junko Morimoto lived 1.7 kilometres away from where the Hiroshima bomb fell. She's 83 now.
Seems unlikely terrorists are going to be able to come up with 1 megaton bomb, and smuggle it into the port of Miami. There is a reason US bound cargo is inspected in the port of departure on foreign soil, and the same opportunity is offered to any other trading partner that requests it of the US.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Saturday January 13 2018, @09:37PM (2 children)
There's three possible scenarios here:
1: A smuggled weapon from a major power. This could be strong or relatively weak, and you can't reasonably plan for which.
2: Something put together by an inexperienced weaponeer. This is likely to fail, but if it works it's likely to be larger than the Hiroshima bomb, because making small nuclear weapons takes more skill.
3: A nuclear weapon that doesn't depend on fission or fusion. Usually this means a "dirty bomb", in which case the question is what are the involved nucleotides. Strontium is nasty, because it replaces calcium in the body. Cobalt is nasty because it has a short, but not extremely short, half-life. Lots of radiation and hangs around for awhile. Questions here involve things like "Is the dust light or heavy?" (I.e., what's the dispersion?) Also what's the bioavailability of the nucleotide? Radioactive carbohydrates would be bad news that way, even though Carbon isn't very radioactive. Phosphorous would be worse...that integrates into the DNA. But I don't know it's half-lives. And, as mentioned above, "which way is the wind blowing?", though that's probably a short term consideration rather than a long term. It tends to change too often.
Case 3 is probably the most likely (with case 1 in second place), and is also the least disastrous...though that's not saying very much.
OTOH, a single nuclear blast isn't any worse that a few days of saturation bombing. It's different, and more shocking, but the damage is more concentrated rather than worse. The problem is if there isn't just one. Nuclear autumn (not really winter) is a real possibility. Think of world-wide crop failures, probably total crop failures. Long pig would probably have been a menu item for everyone that survives....but that wouldn't be most. Russia would see General Winter march through with a degree of thoroughness that Napoleon never experienced, and neither did anyone back to their great-great-great-...-grandparents. I don't recall whether the models said that the glaciers would have time to reform before the following thaw, but the models I saw are no long out of date anyway. The best model for this kind of thing I have is:
An axe age, a sword age,
Shields shall be broken,
A wind age, a wolf age,
Ere the world totters.
I don't think there's a country on the face of the world that could survive two years of total crop failure.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by realDonaldTrump on Sunday January 14 2018, @08:34AM (1 child)
We need a lot of cobalt. For our nuclear arsenal and for many things for our military. We need so much that, unfortunately, we need to import a lot of it. From troubled countries like DR Congo and Canada. But Section 1502 of the Dodd-Frank Act has been holding back our industries. I want Congress to RESCIND IT! But I've sent our amazing military to Niger, where there are amazing deposits of cobalt. Don't worry, folks, we'll get that cobalt, one way or another.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by HiThere on Sunday January 14 2018, @06:10PM
I think you're a joke, and I really hope so. But I sure wish I felt more certain about it.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by tftp on Sunday January 14 2018, @01:14AM