Click on my lightsaber to see what some kids do with themselves and things that glow....
Posted on 02/15/2009 9:15:56 AM PST by fanfan
Tritium emits beta particles - electrons. You know, those things that come out of the wall socket? Any claims that it causes cancer are bunko.
Smoke detectors contain Americium-241, not Tritium.
Turn off all the lights then start looking around. They probably fell off the wall then were kicked behind some boxes or storage shelves.........
SNIP* CRACKPOT DHIREN BAROT: Redacted evidence provides riches of embarrassment
http://www.dickdestiny.com/blog/2007/02/crackpot-dhiren-barot-redacted-evidence.html
In other words, one is asked to believe that a dirty bomb can be made from thousands of smoke detectors.
However, making a dirty bomb from a lorry full of the household items wasn’t Barot’s only wish. He also fiddled with other really stupid ideas.
One involved used exit signs as a weapon of terror. In the United States, exit signs containing a very small amount of tritium, a radioisotope of hydrogen, have been smashed in buildings and thrown into landfills (broken and leaking) for years. It’s thought to be a slight hazard but no one really cares about the issue as the danger is negligible.
One of Dhiren Barot’s dirty bomb plots proposed the throwing of exist signs into the middle of rooms.
Tritium readily forms water when exposed to oxygen. As it undergoes radioactive decay, tritium emits a very low energy beta particle and transforms to stable, nonradioactive helium. Tritium has a half-life of 12.3 years.
Current treatment of landfill leachates do not remove tritium.
As with all ionizing radiation, exposure to tritium increases the risk of developing cancer. However, because it emits very low energy radiation and leaves the body relatively quickly, for a given amount of activity ingested, tritium is one of the least dangerous radionuclides. Since tritium is almost always found as water, it goes directly into soft tissues and organs. The associated dose to these tissues are generally uniform and dependent on the tissues’ water content.
Barot also dallied with getting tritium for a dirty bomb from wristwatches.
Further explained in EPA fact sheet and/or search:tritium exit signs, etc.
More at: http://www.epa.gov/radiation/radionuclides/tritium.html
I wonder if “Good” “Union” companies like Target & Costco have such nefarious devices in their stores?
How charmingly Canadian!
Really, this Wal-Mart’s fault.
Really, I mean it. Those little old ladies at the exit doors
have got to be taught how to tackle those
thieves instead of...”thanks for shopping Wal-Mart.”
Tritium is used in H-bombs.
Be VERY afraid.
Just be prepared to nuke someone (Mecca?) in response.
Cheers!
It has a half life of about 12 1/2 years, so it is around for a while.
However, EPA does state “ may increase the risk “
http://www.epa.gov/radiation/radionuclides/tritium.html#environment
Yes, it’s called CYA.
DETROIT — A man who became the subject of a book called "The Radioactive Boy Scout" after trying to build a nuclear reactor in a shed as a teenager has been charged with stealing 16 smoke detectors. Police say it was a possible effort to experiment with radioactive materials.
David Hahn, 31, was being held Friday on a $5,000 bond in the Macomb County Jail after he was arraigned Thursday on felony larceny charges. Clinton Township police Capt. Richard Maierle said Hahn denied the charges.
A district court clerk on Friday said Hahn did not have an attorney. The Associated Press called the jail in an effort to speak to Hahn, but a sheriff's spokesman said the jail does not give messages to inmates. His preliminary examination was scheduled for Aug. 13.
Investigators say Hahn was arrested Wednesday after a maintenance worker saw him stealing a detector from a ceiling in an apartment complex where he lived. They later found the other detectors in his apartment in the Detroit suburb of Clinton Township.
Police say that Hahn's face was covered with open sores, possibly from constant exposure to radioactive materials.
Hahn learned that a small amount of a radioactive isotope could be found in smoke detectors during his experiments in the 1990s, according to a 1998 article in Harper's Magazine that later expanded into a book by journalist Ken Silverstein.
Maierle said his department evacuated the apartment complex and called the state police bomb squad, which found no hazardous materials.
He said officials learned in January that Hahn had returned to the area after serving in the U.S. Navy.
"Because of his past, we were a tad bit concerned," he said, adding his department alerted the FBI when they found out he was back in Michigan. "We didn't want any other radioactive sites to pop up."
Hahn's first brush with authorities came in August 1994, after police stopped him during an investigation into neighborhood tire thefts. Officers found radioactive materials, chemicals, rocks, plastic and glass bottles and two exploded pipes in his car, Maierle said.
In a subsequent interview with a state health official, Hahn said he had been trying to produce energy and hoped it would help him earn his Eagle Scout badge, according to the Harper's article. Hahn also acknowledged having a backyard laboratory in a potting shed at his mother's home in Oakland County's Commerce Township, the article said.
Authorities declared the structure a hazardous materials site and sealed it. Crews from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency led a Superfund cleanup in 2005 that included dismantling the shed and shipping its remains to be buried at a low-level radioactive waste site in Utah, the article said.
Hahn received a Scouting merit badge for atomic energy in 1991, the article said.
Maierle said Hahn's 1994 arrest was expunged in 1996. His arrest this week was reported by The Macomb Daily of Mount Clemens.
Seems like every WalMart door would have an exit sign, plus a security camera pointed at it to catch anyone leaving with unpaid for merchandise. And none of these security cameras saw anyone unscrewing and unwiring a single sign?
Sounds like the makings of a particularly dirty weapon that can be used in crowds without anybody knowing until the effects start showing up.
Your post is very informative, especially since my knowledge of tritium is right up there with my knowledge of rocket science. However, the info you posted won’t get disseminated and the press, if they do anything at all with this story, will use it to frighten and stampede the public.
I remember I came across a guy who would enter a site talk about just this very subject a couple years back. He was out of England. Pretty detailed as well, so watched for him to come on (usually Monday) and notified authorities just in case. The person would talk about how to make a dirty bombs and the radius it would take to do damage etc. He would focus on compiling smoke detectors etc. Said he had done this and tested it. He was probably a nut case but... That is why this story sparked my interest.
Sounds like BS to me.
You can go into just about any store and purchase far more deadly items if you want to hurt people.
Common household cleanrs, pool sanitizers, bottled propane and so on.
Exit signs? Please....
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.