Fun for the whole family!
Jorn Barger
> This is a 1 megaton bomb. Any terrorist bomb would be (1) nuclear, rather
> than hydrogen, and (2) substantially smaller.
And (3) detonated at ground level, which makes a huge difference (much
_less_ damage). I wrote this in 1996, post-OKC:
===
One of the tv news magazines recently reported that vast quantities of
fissionable material seem to be missing in Russia, and that the
likelihood of a major US city being hit by nuclear terrorism in the
near future is extremely high.
One prefers not to think about such things, possibly from a
superstition that not thinking about them 'keeps them at bay'... and
anyone who prefers this direction is advised not to read this post.
But I think *if* the likelihood is enormous, then it's time we do some
emergency planning. I expect there's others who've done a better job
of this that I can, already, but I haven't run across any...
I haven't done much special research, but I've read reports on OKC and
Hiroshima and Chernobyl. Please correct my mistakes if you see them.
The likelihood?
I believe the tv show must have been A&E's "Investigative Report" on
Iran's counterfeit $100 bills. They explained that Iran's main motive
for printing a billion dollars worth was to buy, not just a nuclear
arsenal, but the capacity to build their own bombs.
To show how possible this was, they discussed a long list of missing
nuclear materials, including (most alarmingly) some "nuclear grenades"
built by the Russians, meant to fit in a suitcase-sized container.
The total missing fissionable material could build thousands and
thousands of bombs, they claimed.
It's generally agreed that Moscow is more corrupted by organized crime
than any comparable city. I can imagine the Moscow crime families
have a standing offer for nuclear materials, and a standing bribe for
guards who'll look the other way while they remove critical components
from missiles, etc. So it wouldn't be surprising to learn, in a few
years, that *most* of the Soviet arsenal has been sold off to the
highest bidders.
(It's possible that attempts at nuclear terrorism have already taken
place, but simply *didn't go off*.)
The scenario:
(This scenario is not about Chicago-in-particular. It's likelier to
happen in NYC, but nobody is *safe*.)
Chicago, April 19, 1999. 12 noon. A Ryder truck parked at the base of
the Sears Tower ignites with the power of the original Hiroshima
A-bomb-- about 15 kilotons.
The first flash illuminates the clouds and the surrounding buildings.
Hundreds of thousands of people who got an early start on lunch, or
whose rooms have windows, see the reflected light and look towards it.
Simultaneously, the "Electromagnetic Pulse" (EMP) fries every
microchip within some large radius-- tvs, radios, telephones,
computers all go dead. Cars with microchips stall in place, including
Lake Shore Drive.
Within seconds, all the windows in the Sears Tower are gone, and an
incandescent blast has incinerated most of the occupants. All
buildings within a few blocks are brought down. A wider ring suffers
earthquake-like damage, and fire. (Every sprinkler system in the Loop
will probably be triggered by the blast. But is this enough to stop a
firestorm?)
The blast will blow a lot of people out of windows, like when a plane
door comes open in flight. In the seconds after the blast, the Loop
rains glass and other debris, like a thirty-second tornado passing
thru.
The sound of the blast travels outward at 1000 ft/sec, breaking
windows thruout the city, alerting almost everyone that their lives
are changing, irreversibly-- that in that moment they have all lost
many friends.
The base of the Tower is so vaporized that the building begins to
topple. This is concealed by the mushroom cloud, though, which is
visible to the millions who now stand in shock-- the whole city
looking that way, thinking what steps they should take.
Reaction
Within seconds after the blast, the streets of the Loop fill with
pedestrians, fleeing for home. Others join in helping the injured--
severe burns and broken limbs needing help to get away from the risk
of fire. Strong winds might allow the fire to overtake those trying
to flee-- exit routes will be blocked by cars and chaos.
Wind direction will determine what neighborhoods get the worst
fallout. Extinguishing the ground-zero fire will be urgent, because
it will be belching radioactivity into the air. Access by helicopter
is probably more realistic than by street, because there will be so
much debris and so many wounded to evacuate. (This is an area where
advance planning could make a huge difference.)
Volunteers will use their cars (if still working) to ferry wounded to
hospitals. People will have to improvise stretchers out of debris,
etc. Everybody will have to make triage decisions. Medical teams
will arrive from local hospitals and work on-site. (Open air field
hospitals would be a bad idea, because of fallout.)
The news of the blast will begin to reach the rest of the world, with
TV interrupted worldwide, camera crews organizing to begin coverage.
Perhaps some crews broadcasting live will stay on the air, and radio
hosts whose transmitters survive will begin collecting reports. Power
and communications will be out over most of the city, but the suburbs
may not be immediately affected.
The phone lines will be jammed with people checking on each other.
Clearinghouses will be quickly established to coordinate people
notifying their relatives that they're alive. The first estimates of
the dead may be in the millions, but this number will diminish and
will finally be in the low hundreds of thousands.
Emergency teams will mobilize. The hospitals nearest the site will
immediately fill with the injured, and their overflow will spread
quickly over hundreds of miles-- hundreds of thousands of severe burn
victims. Blood supplies will be gone within hours, and an
international mobilization for blood will take place.
The walking wounded will struggle home, knowing their wounds are not
great enough to get attention for many days. Public health workers
will broadcast advice on caring for your own wounds, and recognizing
when you should come in for special attention. Everybody will be
advised to take iodine supplements, to forestall thyroid cancer. (Are
these still stockpiled by civil defense agencies?)
Food stores will be looted, or will sell out their stock. Food
distribution will be undertaken by emergency teams.
Cleanup
Searching for survivors will be hazardous around ground zero. Thruout
the surrounding blocks will be hundreds of thousands of abandoned
offices to be searched. Anti-radiation gear will probably not be
available, so the searchers will be dooming themselves to serious
radiation poisoning.
Probably, every corpse will have to be identified and given to
relatives for burial or cremation, but at some level the decision may
be made to use mass burial instead.
Chicago's train system will be completely disrupted, but buses will
continue to function. All business in the Loop will stop for months,
while the radioactive dust is cleaned up. A mass evacuation will have
to take place. Corporations will relocate their surviving employees.
Some will not have enough people left to continue, or to compete
effectively.
There will be a series of concentric zones around ground zero--
completely closed, evacuated by order, voluntary evacuation,
unaffected. The evacuated sections of the city will have people who
refuse to leave. They'll be patrolled by the National Guard, and
looting will take place. Mass detention of looters, etc, might use
sports stadiums.
Overnight, a million people will have no jobs, and probably no bank
accounts. (Are these backed up safely somewhere?) Soup-kitchens will
have to serve millions, for months.
I think most insurance specifically excludes acts of war, and likely
these damages would not be covered.
Millions of people will ask to stay with relatives in other cities.
Some for days or weeks, others as the start of a permanent relocation.
In typical Chicago style, the way the evacuation-zones are drawn will
be determined by who offers the biggest bribes. The value of suburban
office space will skyrocket.
The government will create tens of thousands of jobs doing cleanup and
emergency services. Weather reports will include radiation-maps that
are compiled from thousands of daily ground observations with geiger
counters. These figures will slowly drop, and people will be eager to
return despite the danger.
As zones are declared inhabitable again, people will return with a
sense that they're really not safe. Women who were pregnant when the
bomb exploded will lose their babies, or bear deformed children.
It will be months before Chicagoans feel that the emergency itself is
over, and the recovery can begin. Large parts of the Loop will be
levelled and a new neighborhood created from scratch.
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