5 ms·

I am in Boulder too and I think the comment means, imminent in Boulder proper. But you are of course right, this is a horrifying thing happening right now for m

I am in Boulder too and I think the comment means, imminent in Boulder proper. But you are of course right, this is a horrifying thing happening right now for many people just a few miles away.

justinator 5y ago
I meant imminent to the Rocky Flats area. Of course all the buildings were razed, but I would assume it wouldn't be a Good Thing for that place to also be on fire.
- nyokodo 5y ago
  > I would assume it wouldn't be a Good Thing for that place to also be on fire. The radioactive stuff was all removed or well buried. I’m more worried about the large subdivision built on the site burning down.
  - olliej 5y ago
    I think the issue is how well remediated it’s actually is. I presume that there are a reasonable number of people who doubt that the remediation was actually complete enough to be safe against wild fires
    - bitexploder 5y ago
      Rocky Flats is famous for one of the few times two federal agencies fought one another. I don’t trust they remediated it properly at all.
      - olliej 5y ago
        That was what I expected, but having not lived in the vicinity I didn't want to invent "facts", even though I am a random person on the internet so inventing facts should be my job :D
  - monocasa 5y ago
    Eh, the place that built the subdivision sues the crap out of anyone that tries to get more testing done. And there's a lot of methodological issues with the tests that they do have. Like using gamma radiation tests for plutonium contamination (plutonium is primarily an alpha emitter as it decays). Also the fuckers had the audacity to name the subdivision 'Candelas'. For those following along at home, Rocky Flats was a plutonium warhead manufacturing facility raided by the feds back in the day for doing crazy stuff like lighting plutonium on fire, and not coming anywhere near close to what would be expected for storing contaminated materials. It then became one of the first super fund sites.
    - JPKab 5y ago
      I live in the subdivision. When you purchase a home there you are legally required to be provided and then sign a document that outlines the history of the Rocky Flats plutonium facility. I was provided this document and had to sign it as do every other homeowner here. What I've learned is that people who don't really know anyone that lives there or have never bothered to talk to anyone who purchased homes make assumptions about the entire area. They assume that the people that purchase homes were ignorant rubes who weren't aware of the sites history. I knew about the site and researched it for well over a year before I chose to buy a home in the neighborhood. I spoke with a nuclear physicist who lives in the neighborhood. I also have a co-worker who is also a physicist and was once in charge of a nuclear reactor at his university. There were over a quarter million soil samples taken from the area surrounding the core containment area. There was decades of testing by the EPA. It was a super fund site for decades. Additionally the neighborhood is not built on the site. It is built outside of a perimeter, well over a mile and a half from the core area that was covered over with concrete where the soil still contains traces of plutonium. As you pointed out plutonium is indeed in alpha emitter rather than gamma. It's also extremely heavy and oxidizes on contact with oxygen. It's not the kind of substance that's going to blow around. It will kill you if you inhale it or ingest it of course. I have many photos of herds of elk in the refuge that surrounds the core site. It's not at all the wasteland that people make it out to be. Additionally your first statement claiming that a single company sues people who want to do testing is completely incorrect and can't be backed up by any references. I live here and I happen to know that no single company developed the subdivision. It was purposefully set up by the government of Arvada as a zone and split amongst multiple developers. Additionally more testing has been done in the land around the refuge which the developers have no control over or legal standing. As to testing within the subdivision, the homeowners can test whatever they want in their yards with no permission from the developers. Like a lot of anti-nuclear misinformation it doesn't even make sense when you dig into it. Additionally the fire never got to a point where it was going to hit Rocky flats. Rocky flats and the surrounding area were placed under a pre-evacuation order in the event that the wind shifted. I live here that's why I know this.
  - JPKab 5y ago
    The remediations are massive concrete structures covering large swaths of the ground. A brush fire being pushed by heavy winds isn't going to do anything to it. Additionally the large subdivision was not built on the site but surrounding the perimeter to the site. The core site is off limits to anyone as a precaution to prevent anyone from tampering with the remediations or deliberately vandalizing them. Surrounding the core site is a wildlife refuge that is fairly large. On the outside of this refuge is the subdivision.
    - tamaharbor 5y ago
      But what about the several plutonium fires during Rocky Flats operation and the associated plumes of contamination to the immediate south then east of the plant?
      - JPKab 5y ago
        If you look at the map of that plume, you see that it was most heavily concentrated in areas miles to the east. Ironically my neighborhood is right off of 72 and 93 and is completely white on the map. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_contamination_from_the_Rocky_Flats_Plant https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_contamination_fr... Note that this Wikipedia article isn't up to date and has some biased editing. For example Rocky flats refuge has been open to the public for a couple of years now. The article has the typical antinuclear activist tactic of FUD. As a person who has to deal with climate change related incidents like the fire yesterday, I have huge animosity towards anti-nuclear activists. The same people who have been protesting everything nuclear for decades are the ones complaining about climate change now without seeming to understand that all of the Western world would be like France now if not for them. The fire we are ringing our hands about potentially causing contamination probably would not have happened if not for these activists destroying the reputation of nuclear power over several decades.
        letitbeirie 5y ago
        There’s a term in German - verschlimmbessern - that might as well be Greenpeace’s motto. Loosely translated it means “making things worse in an honest yet failed attempt to make them better.”

I am in Boulder too and I think the comment means, imminent in Boulder proper. But you are of course right, this is a horrifying thing happening right now for many people just a few miles away.

justinator 5y ago

I meant imminent to the Rocky Flats area. Of course all the buildings were razed, but I would assume it wouldn't be a Good Thing for that place to also be on fire.

nyokodo 5y ago
> I would assume it wouldn't be a Good Thing for that place to also be on fire. The radioactive stuff was all removed or well buried. I’m more worried about the large subdivision built on the site burning down.
- olliej 5y ago
  I think the issue is how well remediated it’s actually is. I presume that there are a reasonable number of people who doubt that the remediation was actually complete enough to be safe against wild fires
  - bitexploder 5y ago
    Rocky Flats is famous for one of the few times two federal agencies fought one another. I don’t trust they remediated it properly at all.
    - olliej 5y ago
      That was what I expected, but having not lived in the vicinity I didn't want to invent "facts", even though I am a random person on the internet so inventing facts should be my job :D
- monocasa 5y ago
  Eh, the place that built the subdivision sues the crap out of anyone that tries to get more testing done. And there's a lot of methodological issues with the tests that they do have. Like using gamma radiation tests for plutonium contamination (plutonium is primarily an alpha emitter as it decays). Also the fuckers had the audacity to name the subdivision 'Candelas'. For those following along at home, Rocky Flats was a plutonium warhead manufacturing facility raided by the feds back in the day for doing crazy stuff like lighting plutonium on fire, and not coming anywhere near close to what would be expected for storing contaminated materials. It then became one of the first super fund sites.
  - JPKab 5y ago
    I live in the subdivision. When you purchase a home there you are legally required to be provided and then sign a document that outlines the history of the Rocky Flats plutonium facility. I was provided this document and had to sign it as do every other homeowner here. What I've learned is that people who don't really know anyone that lives there or have never bothered to talk to anyone who purchased homes make assumptions about the entire area. They assume that the people that purchase homes were ignorant rubes who weren't aware of the sites history. I knew about the site and researched it for well over a year before I chose to buy a home in the neighborhood. I spoke with a nuclear physicist who lives in the neighborhood. I also have a co-worker who is also a physicist and was once in charge of a nuclear reactor at his university. There were over a quarter million soil samples taken from the area surrounding the core containment area. There was decades of testing by the EPA. It was a super fund site for decades. Additionally the neighborhood is not built on the site. It is built outside of a perimeter, well over a mile and a half from the core area that was covered over with concrete where the soil still contains traces of plutonium. As you pointed out plutonium is indeed in alpha emitter rather than gamma. It's also extremely heavy and oxidizes on contact with oxygen. It's not the kind of substance that's going to blow around. It will kill you if you inhale it or ingest it of course. I have many photos of herds of elk in the refuge that surrounds the core site. It's not at all the wasteland that people make it out to be. Additionally your first statement claiming that a single company sues people who want to do testing is completely incorrect and can't be backed up by any references. I live here and I happen to know that no single company developed the subdivision. It was purposefully set up by the government of Arvada as a zone and split amongst multiple developers. Additionally more testing has been done in the land around the refuge which the developers have no control over or legal standing. As to testing within the subdivision, the homeowners can test whatever they want in their yards with no permission from the developers. Like a lot of anti-nuclear misinformation it doesn't even make sense when you dig into it. Additionally the fire never got to a point where it was going to hit Rocky flats. Rocky flats and the surrounding area were placed under a pre-evacuation order in the event that the wind shifted. I live here that's why I know this.
- JPKab 5y ago
  The remediations are massive concrete structures covering large swaths of the ground. A brush fire being pushed by heavy winds isn't going to do anything to it. Additionally the large subdivision was not built on the site but surrounding the perimeter to the site. The core site is off limits to anyone as a precaution to prevent anyone from tampering with the remediations or deliberately vandalizing them. Surrounding the core site is a wildlife refuge that is fairly large. On the outside of this refuge is the subdivision.
  - tamaharbor 5y ago
    But what about the several plutonium fires during Rocky Flats operation and the associated plumes of contamination to the immediate south then east of the plant?
    - JPKab 5y ago
      If you look at the map of that plume, you see that it was most heavily concentrated in areas miles to the east. Ironically my neighborhood is right off of 72 and 93 and is completely white on the map. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_contamination_from_the_Rocky_Flats_Plant https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_contamination_fr... Note that this Wikipedia article isn't up to date and has some biased editing. For example Rocky flats refuge has been open to the public for a couple of years now. The article has the typical antinuclear activist tactic of FUD. As a person who has to deal with climate change related incidents like the fire yesterday, I have huge animosity towards anti-nuclear activists. The same people who have been protesting everything nuclear for decades are the ones complaining about climate change now without seeming to understand that all of the Western world would be like France now if not for them. The fire we are ringing our hands about potentially causing contamination probably would not have happened if not for these activists destroying the reputation of nuclear power over several decades.
      - letitbeirie 5y ago
        There’s a term in German - verschlimmbessern - that might as well be Greenpeace’s motto. Loosely translated it means “making things worse in an honest yet failed attempt to make them better.”