Replies

Good point about keeping control of nukes. The United States has fail safe devices designed into all of our nukes that make it absoultely certain that a stolen nuke could never be set off.

However, we do this without relying on a lack of maintenance. The basic idea prevalent on this thread that all of our own nukes need refreshing every 60 days or so is incorrect.

When the initial reports of Soviet suitcase nukes came out in the early 90s, lots of people pointed out the loss of control implied if the Soviets had designed a nuke without the usual fail safe mechanisms. This was one of the most substantial arguments raised against the concept.

Nevertheless, some high level Russian leaders insist that these weapons were built, and that some are missing. In addition, they claim they were built with very primitive fail safe provisions, and a very long shelf life before needing service.

Vladimir Putin claims no nukes are missing. I do not know his stated position on whether suitcase nukes exist.

Presumably President Bush knows the truth of the matter. If so, he hasn't let me in on the secret. Most likely, he hasn't told anyone posting on this thread either.

Another misconception on this thread centers on how large a nuke needs to be. The "steamer trunk" idea is ludicrous. Small nukes most definitely can be built, and several nations have done so (including the U.S.).

In short, we may or may not be facing a threat from small nukes smuggled into our country. But to claim we CANNOT be facing such a threat because of technical reasons is not true.

The United States has fail safe devices designed into all of our nukes that make it absoultely certain that a stolen nuke could never be set off. However, we do this without relying on a lack of maintenance.

Nobody with any sense would rely on short shelf life for security. However, nobody with any sense would deliberately remove the extra safety factor provided by short shelf life, absent a compelling reason to do so.

(I suppose that somebody will pop up with the stories about the Rooskies hiding nukes inside the US. Presumably the Premier loved surprises and was going to unveil this deterrent at the Party Congress on Monday.)

"The basic idea prevalent on this thread that all of our own nukes need refreshing every 60 days or so is incorrect."

On the contrary, however, you've gotten the basic concept wrong.

It's not the nuke per se that needs refreshing and specialized maintenance so much as it is that the triggers for the atomic bombs as well as the electronics for the nuclear devices which both need frequent servicing.

It is a myth that nuclear weapons remain functional forever and never need maintenance.

As posted and repeated (and will continue to be so posted and repeated until everyone who ever visits this thread "gets it") on this thread already, the radioactive elements used in nuclear triggers (e.g. Polonium and Beryllium) decay in mere days due to their short half-lives. Likewise, the booster element Tritium not only decays, but the element into which it decays (He3) is such a powerful neutron sponge that in slightly more than 8 years it can render what was once a functioning nuclear weapon into little more than a dirty bomb.

84

Po

Polonium

209

Polonium

Atomic Number:

84

Atomic Weight:

209

Melting Point:

527 K (489.2°F)

Boiling Point:

1235 K (1763.6°F)

Density:

9.32 grams per cubic centimeter

Phase at Room Temperature:

Solid

Radioactive

What's in a name?		Named for the country of Poland.

Say what?		Polonium is pronounced as peh-LOW-ni-em.

History and Uses:

Polonium was discovered by Marie Sklodowska Curie, a Polish chemist, in 1898. She obtained polonium from pitchblende, a material that contains uranium, after noticing that unrefined pitchblende was more radioactive than the uranium that was separated from it. She reasoned that pitchblende must contain at least one other radioactive element. Curie needed to refine several tons of pitchblende in order to obtain tiny amounts of polonium and radium, another radioactive element discovered by Curie. One ton of uranium ore contains only about 100 micrograms (0.0001 grams) of polonium.

Due to its scarcity, polonium is usually produced by bombarding bismuth-209 with neutrons in a nuclear reactor. This forms bismuth-210, which has a half-life of 5 days. Bismuth-210 decays into polonium-210 through beta decay. Milligram amounts of polonium-210 have been produced by this method.

Polonium-210 is a very strong emitter of alpha particles. A single gram of polonium-210 creates 140 Watts of heat energy and is being considered as a lightweight heat source for thermoelectric power for spacecraft.

Polonium-210 has a half-life of 138.39 days.

Polonium's most stable isotope, polonium-209, has a half-life of 102 years. It decays into lead-205 through alpha decay. Polonium-209 is available from Oak Ridge National Laboratory at the cost of about $3200 per microcurie.

Polonium can be used to eliminate static electricity in machinery that is caused by processes such as the rolling of paper, wire or sheet metal, although other materials which emit beta particles are more commonly used for this purpose. Polonium is also used in brushes for removing dust from photographic films, although the polonium must be carefully sealed to protect the user from contamination. Polonium is also combined with beryllium to form neutron sources.

Estimated Crustal Abundance:		2×10^-10 milligrams per kilogram

Estimated Oceanic Abundance:		1.5×10^-14 milligrams per liter

Number of Stable Isotopes:		0		(View all isotope data)

Ionization Energy:		8.417 eV

Oxidation States:		+4, +2

Electron Shell Configuration:

1s²
2s²	2p⁶
3s²	3p⁶	3d¹⁰
4s²	4p⁶	4d¹⁰	4f¹⁴
5s²	5p⁶	5d¹⁰
6s²	6p⁴