The Mess

[Smitty-48]

You want to know the answer? The primary contaminant in nuclear fallout is strontium-90, it gives off very short range radiation, so it doesn't effect plants, what it does is bond itself to its most similar material, which is calcium, the kind of radiation which kills you from nuclear fallout, kills you by destroying your bone marrow, the plants all around you are fine too, they're not effected, the radiation that is killing you, is killing you by way of the bones.

[Ex-California]

Isn't the theory less near-term and more like a worldwide massive dustbowl due to all the plants dying of radiation?

That how I always understood nuclear winter coming about, not directly from ash from burned cities

If radiation kills all plants, why is Bikini Atoll, one of the most radioactively contaminated places on earth, site of 23 thermonuclear explosions, including the 15 megaton Castle Bravo, an overgrown jungle paradise? Cesium radiation is off the charts, yet palm trees swinging in the breeze all around, it's a radioactive jungle.

Hey, I'm not saying I agree with it, that's just how I understood the theory

Shit, look at Chernobyl. Its more biodiverse than Yellowstone

[Smitty-48]

Isn't the theory less near-term and more like a worldwide massive dustbowl due to all the plants dying of radiation?

That how I always understood nuclear winter coming about, not directly from ash from burned cities

If radiation kills all plants, why is Bikini Atoll, one of the most radioactively contaminated places on earth, site of 23 thermonuclear explosions, including the 15 megaton Castle Bravo, an overgrown jungle paradise? Cesium radiation is off the charts, yet palm trees swinging in the breeze all around, it's a radioactive jungle.

Hey, I'm not saying I agree with it, that's just how I understood the theory

Shit, look at Chernobyl. Its more biodiverse than Yellowstone

I'm just debunking it for you, strontium-90 is the killer in nuclear fallout, but its effects on plant life are minimal.

[TheReal_ND]

I thought I read somewhere it had odd effects on flowers in Japan.

https://weather.com/science/nature/news ... ima-famous

Lol FEEEEED MEE

[Smitty-48]

Fukushima is actually far more radioactive than a hydrogen bomb, hydrogen bomb is just a split second, Fukishima and Chernobyl were prolonged plumes of continously spewing radiation direct from a persistent source, Fukushima has reportedly exceeded the peak radiation levels of all atmosperic nuclear testing already.

[Smitty-48]

Also note, radioactive doesn't mean one thing, there's different types of radiation, gamma rays, alpha particles, neutrons, cesium strongtium-90, etcetera, there's a difference between the prevalence of radioactive isotopes released by a nuclear explosion at the moment of detonation, and the what is prevalent in the fallout after, so radiation is not monolithic, different types of radiation have different types of effects.

So if you're caught in the flash of a nuclear detonation, that's one type of radiation, neutrons and gamma rays mostly, projects over a wide area, in the fallout after, it's different stuff that kills you, and there you're pretty much going to have to inhale or ingest it, fallout doesn't generally kill you just by standing next to it.

What the neutron bomb does, is remove the uranium casing from the hydrogen bomb warhead, because this casing blocks most of the neutrons and gamma rays in the explosion, when you take it out, the neutron flash is increased exponentially, and this is what kills people, but the actual explosion is much smaller, and you airburst it, so you don't destroy the structures, you zap people right through them, and you dont get the fallout after, because with the airburst, you dont iduce the fallout generating mushroom cloud rising up into the jet stream.

[Xenophon]

*waits on GCF's well researched and reasoned rebuttal*

[Montegriffo]

Great to hear you have gone green Smitty. If all that nuclear war does is remove the people if we use neutron bombs I'm starting to think it might be a good idea. Mostly it will be the cities removed and the countryside with no military targets will be left alone. One slight flaw in your argument is that nuclear power stations will be considered targets. Other than that I'm up for it. When can we start?

[SuburbanFarmer]

*waits on GCF's well researched and reasoned rebuttal*

I can't believe you're even taking this seriously. But my tone will be return in kind to the post I'm responding to, as always.

If radiation kills all plants, why is Bikini Atoll, one of the most radioactively contaminated places on earth, site of 23 thermonuclear explosions, including the 15 megaton Castle Bravo, an overgrown jungle paradise? Cesium radiation is off the charts, yet palm trees swinging in the breeze all around, it's a radioactive jungle.

You should totally eat some bananas from there. They'll be really good for you.

Here's a scenario of just 100 Hiroshima-sized weapons going off between India and Pakistan. Nothing even approaching the scale of a US-Russian exchange. http://www.popsci.com/article/science/c ... uclear-war

After the Indian-Pakistani nuclear exchange…

Five megatons of black carbon enter the atmosphere immediately. Black carbon comes from burned stuff and it absorbs heat from the sun before it can reach the Earth. Some black carbon does eventually falls back to Earth in rain.

After one year, the average surface temperature of the Earth falls by 1.1 kelvin, or about two degrees Fahrenheit. After five years, the Earth is, on average, three degrees colder than it used to be. Twenty years on, our home planet warms again to about one degree cooler than the average before the nuclear war.

Earth's falling temperatures reduces the amount of rain the planet receives. Year five after the war, Earth will have 9 percent less rain than usual. Year 26 after the war, Earth gets 4.5 percent less rain than before the war.

In years 2-6 after the war, the frost-free growing season for crops is shortened by 10 to 40 days, depending on the region.

Chemical reactions in the atmosphere eat away Earth's ozone layer, which protects Earth's inhabitants from ultraviolet radiation. In the five years after the war, the ozone is 20 to 25 percent thinner, on average. Ten years on, the ozone layer has recovered so that it's now 8 percent thinner.

The decreased UV protection may lead to more sunburns and skin cancers in people, as well as reduced plant growth and destabilized DNA in crops such as corn.

In a separate study, published in 2013, International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War estimated 2 billion people would starve in the wake of a 100-A-bomb war.

Hippie propaganda, indeed.

[Hanarchy Montanarchy]

Everyone knows Popular Science is just the fake news of the left, also, definitely part of a DNC child-sex ring.

Fun fact, popularscience is also an anagram of a secret Illuminati password... so yeah... propaganda.

Take off the blinders GCF, tame 'em off man.