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ISIS Now Has 88 Pounds of Uranium
- lvh 12y agoFlagged, because it's not hacker related, and it's an intentionally clickbaity title. It's not weapons-grade uranium, and everyone (including the IAEA) seems to agree ISIS most likely does not have the capability to turn it into weapons-grade uranium.
- JoeAltmaier 12y agoAnything sufficiently radioactive is a threat - turn it into dust with a high explosive charge, and kill half a city of people with inhaled carcinogens. So this Uranium is safe somehow?
- yarper 12y ago"Kill half a city" herm, citation needed
- greyfade 12y ago> So this Uranium is safe somehow? In as much that it's impossible to achieve supercriticality with a pile of yellowcake? Yeah. At worst, they risk heavy metal poisoning (as Uranium has effects similar to lead on the human body.) It takes a lot to make an effective weapon out of Uranium. Building a working device requires separating the incredibly rare heavier isotope U-238 from all of the mostly inert U-235. That's what all the controversy about centrifuges in Iran was about: That's the kind of equipment you need to extract fissionable 238 to make a weapon. Uranium isn't even radioactive enough to cause the kind of threat you assume. Materials like Cobalt-60 are far more dangerous, and are the real concern about "dirty bombs," (explosive devices that spread radioactive material, as opposed to a nuclear bomb) but it's far harder to work with, and it's more carefully regulated. The effect of Cobalt-60 without adequate shielding is cancer and eventually radiation sickness. By contrast, the effect of raw Uranium is... to release small amounts of ionized helium gas over billions of years.