As this is also now making news, along with the NYC Dirty Bomb threat, I thought I may as well link it up. No secrets here, just that some UK academics felt there was real room for improvement when it came to the efficiency of potential dirty bombs, so they fleshed it out a bit, secretly of course. Comforting stuff, as we know there is no shortage of Engineers among the jihadi set, or doctors, for that matter.
Essentially, the three academics have been inspired by the recent murder of Russian emigre Alexander Litvinenko, internally poisoned with radioactive Polonium-210.
They have thought of a new abbreviation to describe mass radiological poisoning without the use of explosives - I3, for ingestion, inhalation and immersion.
He told the Graun that his secret plan "would be capable of killing several hundred, maybe upwards of a thousand, and paralysing a city without any question at all", so maybe it is.
"The article does not provide details of the most devastating method of attack the authors have conceived, for security reasons, but Professor Zimmerman described one scenario using a water-soluble radioactive isotope widely used in hospitals and industry: 'I can then tap into the anti-fire spray in a theatre, and if I can trigger the spray, I can soak everyone in the room'," Borger wrote.
Prof Zimmerman is talking about powdered caesium-137, widely used in radiotherapy machinery and such like.
According to the UN nuclear watchdog, just such a nightmare scenario already occurred in Brazil in 1987.
In that case, scavengers broke open a canister of caesium-137 from an old radiotherapy machine. Brazilian locals, thinking the glowing blue powder was pretty, circulated the stuff widely over the next week. Many rubbed it on themselves. Others ate food adulterated with the powder. In all, 237 people were reckoned to have been contaminated by the Brazilian authorities. Four of them died, and a major cleanup operation was required in the various affected homes and businesses.
The professor is trying to be too clever.
Posted by: Purple Avenger | Saturday, August 11, 2007 at 11:05 AM
Why are they spelling Cesium funny?
Posted by: Techie | Monday, August 13, 2007 at 01:40 PM