Heads up. Mayor Giuliani news conference within the hour subject Anthrax

cnn

[newsperson999]

.....must be something big for this late hour.....any rumours floating around out there?

[formernyer]

Does anyone know how much anthrax was released at Sverlofsk or whatever that place was in Russia?? There was definitely a plume effect as people many miles downwind affected AND people got sick a lot later... The thing about NYC is there are a lot of nooks and crannies for this stuff to get caught in I would imagine, ie harder to disperse... Unless there are MEers still planting it around. Why don't we get serious about getting rid of these vermin!!

[blam]

"A suitcase nuke would blow up several blocks. If the goal is just to kill as many people as possible, anthrax would be more effective. Nukes would be more useful for a decapitation strike against our government."

Someone equated the WTC collapse to a small nuke.

[stlnative]

I just got online tonight, so I don't know if anyone posted about this or not yet. Tonight on the local news (St. Louis, Mo) they may have a case of skin anthrax in Hillsboro, MO. There is a lady that handles the mail for the city office of Hillsboro, she has sore on her stomach, and they will test her tomorrow for anthrax. A doctor looked at it but told her he did not know for sure what it was. If I hear anything more I will post it. (BTW... Hillsboro is just outside St. Louis County, I think... it is hard to remember exactly where it is)

[Tree of Liberty]

Somewhere on the order of >1-5 kilotons. I think that'd take out about 5 city blocks, but don't quote me on that.

Our smallest (publically acknowledged) nuke, by comparison, is the Davy Crockett. I've read that, among other applications, the corps of engineers has/had plans to use it to demolish bridges and such when there wasn't time to use conventional explosives.

[Tree of Liberty]

Looks like it's about a half hour outside of STL.

[KsSunflower]

Geez..anthrax by mail. Spend 34 cents and spread spores all along the way. With the budget these guys have to work with, they could sure send an awful lot of letters!

[Clinton's a rapist]

Someone equated the WTC collapse to a small nuke.

That's about right in terms of energy. Depending on where and when it was exploded, the casualties could be a lot higher, though -- I would guess in the tens of thousands, potentially, or perhaps a hundred thousand if it was at a big sports arena.

[floriduh voter]

I don't think it looks good. I was asleep and Rudy's voice from my radio that I leave on all night woke me up. Then I turned Fox on. The bad thing is that the lady didn't do anything until Sunday night as far as I know. Anybody working in or near any mail room needs to get tested if they come down with any possible signs.

I guess not everyone is a news junkie and aren't aware but it is a medical facility she was in.

[KsSunflower]

Yeah, floriduh, but it sure sounds like it progressed rapidly!

[HiTech RedNeck]

How would toting a tiny nuke to a bridge, etc. be quicker than shooting a missile?

[stlnative]

Thanks for the reply...
Yes let's hope that the hospital has not been infected. I have not kept up with the stories since the middle of last week.
But it is getting stranger as each hour now passes by.
I am starting to think that we might be in for a larger anthrax infection.
What they have done seems to be working and they still may be mailing out more envelopes daily.
There is just no way to tell if they are doing this daily right now.

I think the NYC mayor got on TV tonight because this woman may not make it through the night.
I hope she will be ok, but it is strange why they had the live announcement tonight so late.

Well I am going to surf the others stories and see what is new tonight.

[HiTech RedNeck]

Anybody working in or near any mail room needs to get tested if they come down with any possible signs

Oh great, everybody near a mailroom who gets a cold or flu would have to run to the emergency room. Talk about overwhelming medical facilities.

[blam]

"Geez..anthrax by mail. Spend 34 cents and spread spores all along the way. With the budget these guys have to work with, they could sure send an awful lot of letters!"

As I understand it, inhalation almost requires 'modified' (small size) anthrax spores to contract....and a lot of them.

[stlnative]

I am not sure how she got it... I guess they will check the hospital out to see if they find any traces of anthrax. If they don't then they will check her home out next. If they don't find it there... then there is no telling where she picked it up at. The first case where they cannot find a trace or source is going to be the ones that worry me most.

[blam]

"Oh great, everybody near a mailroom who gets a cold or flu would have to run to the emergency room."

I guess this will give 'the check is in the mail' a new meaning. The government burned it?

[stlnative]

I am a native of St. Louis, But moved away in 1994. I live about 100 miles south of St. Louis nowadays in Illinois. We still can pick up the local St. Louis TV stations where I live. That's how I heard about the story. I think Hillsboro is south down Hwy 55. I know it is a small town. I have probably been through it before many times. There are so many small towns outside St. Louis City & St. Louis County I have trouble keeping track of exactly where all of them are located.

[Tree of Liberty]

I'd think it'd be dependent on the ordnance and manpower available and the energy required to take out the piece of infrastructure in question. I imagine that it'd be for LARGE bridges similar to the Golden Gate or Brooklyn Bridge in size, or caverns and caves like Iwo Jima. You'd have to talk to a military engineer to get specifics. I'm just going speculating based on things I've read here and there.

[floriduh voter]

A visit to one's doctor is prudent to get antibiotics and testing which doesn't have to be cipro if you work in or near a mailroom, especially in NYC or DC. I guess she was pretty sick by Saturday but Americans are pretty stubborn about going to the doctor. The crooks know this imho.

[floriduh voter]

It progressed rapidly because there were lots of minute spores. You can speculate on the date she was exposed too. The spores can then hide in the system reproducing in the lungs then to the lymph nodes and then swelling and causing leaking veins. It does progress rapidly. We got lots of info here in Fla. when the first guy died from it. That Ernesto Blanco pulled through is quite something. 90 percent exposed to inhalation anthrax don't make it.

[stlnative]

Here is a hard copy of the Hillsboro, MO possible Anthrax case.

It will probably end up being just a spider bite, probably from a fiddle back spider.

Anthrax scare shuts Hillsboro courthouse
BY TIM ROWDEN
Of the Post-Dispatch
10/29/2001 08:44 PM

About 200 employees and 100 visitors were evacuated from the Jefferson County Courthouse in Hillsboro on Monday as a precaution because a mailroom employee was found to have a lesion on her abdomen.

County Commissioner Ed Kemp, who also is the county's acting director of emergency services, said there was no reason to believe that she or anyone there has anthrax. Health officials said they did not believe that she was infected.

Kemp said the courthouse would reopen today.

In another anthrax-related scare, a yellowish powder found inside a letter Sunday morning at the main post office in downtown St. Louis tested negative for anthrax, spokeswoman JoAnne Hartmann said Monday.

The substance was in an unsealed envelope with no return address that had been mailed from a European country, a source close to the case said. It was addressed to CNN on North Grand Boulevard. There is no CNN office there or anywhere in St. Louis.

In Jefferson County, the courthouse was closed about 1 p.m., and a hazardous materials team was put on standby after the woman's personal doctor told her that he could not immediately determine whethr she had a spider bite or cutaneous (skin) anthrax.

Another physician, Dr. Thomas Hartmann of the emergency room at St. Anthony's Medical Center in south St. Louis County, said it appeared to be an insect bite. But Hartmann said both the woman and a co-worker in the mailroom had been tested for anthrax and would be treated with antibiotics as a precaution.

"I think the odds of anything turning up positive is extremely remote," Hartmann said. "We feel that the courthouse can safely reopen."