4 ms·

can you tell us about the reasons for their skepticism?

dctoedt 13y ago
> can you tell us about the reasons for their skepticism? The consensus seems to be that the exposure numbers being reported don't make any sense under the circumstances. (I've been out for years, so I'm not qualified to offer an opinion of my own.)
- awakeasleep 13y ago
  Can you say anything about how radiation detection occurs? I'm specifically interested in the idea that the carrier was in irradiated water for a long time. Do the radiation sensors in the ship really need to be 'turned on' in a long process? Would there be any geiger counter or something that automatically detects whether the water the ship takes in is tainted? It seems crazy to me that there wouldn't be an always-on, cheap, sanity check.
  - karlkatzke 13y ago
    That was the part of the article that jumped out at me. I live in a university town. Various parts of the research arms of the university have various radiological materials on hand for experiments or ongoing work. There's an old, decommissioned nuclear reactor near the airport. ALL of the people who work in these facilities wear dosimeters that change color if an incident resulting in overexposure occurs. ALL of the emergency response teams in the area (campus police, county, city, city fire, and county volunteer fire) have a geiger counter on each truck -- there is a mini one that is just a box on the trucks, and the hazmat trailer with the chem suits has a bigger and more sensitive one with a wand. And this is just a small town research university kind of place, not a big government warship that's designed to fight nuclear wars. On top of that, I'm 99% sure that distilling water removes the radioactive contaminants.
  - dctoedt 13y ago
    I don't know what today's Navy ships have by way of always-on ambient radiation detectors, and to be honest I don't remember exactly what we had in my day; I'm sure I learned it while qualifying, but my day-to-day duties were in other areas. I can say that even in my day we were constantly monitoring ambient conditions -- and one of the things we constantly drummed into each other was to look for trends, not just instantaneous readings (life isn't a snapshot, it's a movie).
- justin66 13y ago
  How do the people who've reached this consensus react to the statement that the lawyers made that they've got at least 70 sailors who are really sick, half of whom have some kind of cancer? Do they think the lawyers are just making that part up? Do they have some alternate explanation for the illnesses, something that doesn't involve all that radiation? It's interesting that these people you're describing are so concerned with the part that's hard to prove or disprove. The number of sick people seems rather more significant.
  - dctoedt 13y ago
    > Do they think the lawyers are just making that part up? Do they have some alternate explanation for the illnesses, something that doesn't involve all that radiation? See the Telephone Game, a.k.a. Chinese Whispers. [1] It's amazing how stories get distorted in the retelling. I collected lots of examples on my blog. [2] [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_whispers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_whispers [2] http://www.questioningchristian.com/distortions/ http://www.questioningchristian.com/distortions/
- crazytony 13y ago
  the article does a terrible job with facts but I would have thought the carrier would be equipped with dosimeters for the crew? Would it have been standard operating procedure for them to don the dosimeters given the understanding of the events unfolding in the area?
  - dctoedt 13y ago
    > I would have thought the carrier would be equipped with dosimeters for the crew? Would it have been standard operating procedure for them to don the dosimeters given the understanding of the events unfolding in the area? I can't say for sure how things are now, but back in the day the answers would have been Yes and Yes.

> can you tell us about the reasons for their skepticism? The consensus seems to be that the exposure numbers being reported don't make any sense under the circumstances. (I've been out for years, so I'm not qualified to offer an opinion of my own.)

awakeasleep 13y ago
Can you say anything about how radiation detection occurs? I'm specifically interested in the idea that the carrier was in irradiated water for a long time. Do the radiation sensors in the ship really need to be 'turned on' in a long process? Would there be any geiger counter or something that automatically detects whether the water the ship takes in is tainted? It seems crazy to me that there wouldn't be an always-on, cheap, sanity check.
- karlkatzke 13y ago
  That was the part of the article that jumped out at me. I live in a university town. Various parts of the research arms of the university have various radiological materials on hand for experiments or ongoing work. There's an old, decommissioned nuclear reactor near the airport. ALL of the people who work in these facilities wear dosimeters that change color if an incident resulting in overexposure occurs. ALL of the emergency response teams in the area (campus police, county, city, city fire, and county volunteer fire) have a geiger counter on each truck -- there is a mini one that is just a box on the trucks, and the hazmat trailer with the chem suits has a bigger and more sensitive one with a wand. And this is just a small town research university kind of place, not a big government warship that's designed to fight nuclear wars. On top of that, I'm 99% sure that distilling water removes the radioactive contaminants.
- dctoedt 13y ago
  I don't know what today's Navy ships have by way of always-on ambient radiation detectors, and to be honest I don't remember exactly what we had in my day; I'm sure I learned it while qualifying, but my day-to-day duties were in other areas. I can say that even in my day we were constantly monitoring ambient conditions -- and one of the things we constantly drummed into each other was to look for trends, not just instantaneous readings (life isn't a snapshot, it's a movie).
justin66 13y ago
How do the people who've reached this consensus react to the statement that the lawyers made that they've got at least 70 sailors who are really sick, half of whom have some kind of cancer? Do they think the lawyers are just making that part up? Do they have some alternate explanation for the illnesses, something that doesn't involve all that radiation? It's interesting that these people you're describing are so concerned with the part that's hard to prove or disprove. The number of sick people seems rather more significant.
- dctoedt 13y ago
  > Do they think the lawyers are just making that part up? Do they have some alternate explanation for the illnesses, something that doesn't involve all that radiation? See the Telephone Game, a.k.a. Chinese Whispers. [1] It's amazing how stories get distorted in the retelling. I collected lots of examples on my blog. [2] [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_whispers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_whispers [2] http://www.questioningchristian.com/distortions/ http://www.questioningchristian.com/distortions/
crazytony 13y ago
the article does a terrible job with facts but I would have thought the carrier would be equipped with dosimeters for the crew? Would it have been standard operating procedure for them to don the dosimeters given the understanding of the events unfolding in the area?
- dctoedt 13y ago
  > I would have thought the carrier would be equipped with dosimeters for the crew? Would it have been standard operating procedure for them to don the dosimeters given the understanding of the events unfolding in the area? I can't say for sure how things are now, but back in the day the answers would have been Yes and Yes.