The Real Deal about Bio-Terror

THE "REAL" DEAL ABOUT NUCLEAR, BIO, AND CHEM ATTACKS
=====================================================

This is another one of those "not inspirational" but hopefully
educational issues. You should not live in fear. I am a chemist
by educational training, so I understand much of the technical
aspects of this. You don't have to be an expert to understand it.

Potential terrorism is reported with increasing frequency.
Anthrax and potentially smallpox and other attacks have scared
the nation. People hope their symptoms are the flu, not anthrax.
Sure anthrax is deadlier, just as a bazooka is deadlier than a
.38 pistol.

You are far more likely however to be killed by a pistol than a
bazooka. Eighteen people so far have died from anthrax. That
is a tragedy and I am not belittling the hurt those families are
going through. 20,000 will die this year from the flu.

Truth will help dispel fear and allow you to concentrate on the
real danger and the things that you can control, read on...
----------------------------------------------------------

"REAL" DEAL ABOUT NUCLEAR, BIO, AND CHEM ATTACKS

Since the media has decided to scare everyone with predictions
of chemical, biological, or nuclear warfare on our turf, I
decided to write a paper and keep things in their proper
perspective.

I am a retired military weapons, munitions, and training expert.

Lesson number one: In the mid 1990's there were a series of
nerve gas attacks on crowded Japanese subway stations. Given
perfect conditions for an attack, less than 10% of the people
there were injured (the injured were better in a few hours) and
only one percent of the injured died.

60 Minutes once had a fellow telling us that one drop of nerve
gas could kill a thousand people, well he didn't tell you the
thousand dead people per drop was theoretical.

Drill Sergeants exaggerate how terrible this stuff was to keep
the recruits awake in class (I know this because I was a Drill
Sergeant too). Forget everything you've ever seen on TV, in the
movies, or read in a novel about this stuff, it was all a lie
(read this sentence again out loud!!) These weapons are about
terror; if you remain calm, you will probably not die.

This is far less scary than the media and their "Experts" make
it sound. Chemical weapons are categorized as Nerve, Blood,
Blister, and Incapacitating agents.

Contrary to the hype of reporters and politicians they are not
weapons of mass destruction. They are "Area denial" and terror
weapons that don't destroy anything. When you leave the area
you almost always leave the risk. That's the difference; you
can leave the area and the risk; soldiers may have to stay put
and sit through it and that's why they need all that spiffy
gear.

These are not gasses, they are vapors and/or air borne
particles. The agent must be delivered in sufficient quantity
to kill/injure, and that defines when/how it's used.

Every day we have a morning and evening inversion where "stuff"
suspended in the air gets pushed down. This inversion is why
allergies (pollen) and air pollution are worst at these times of
the day. So, a chemical attack will have it's best effect an
hour or so either side of sunrise/sunset. Also, being vapors
and airborne particles, they are heavier than air so they will
seek low places like ditches, basements and underground garages.

This stuff won't work when it's freezing, it doesn't last when
it's hot, and wind spreads it too thin too fast.

They've got to get this stuff on you, or get you to inhale it
for it to work. They also have to get the concentration of
chemicals high enough to kill or wound you.

Too little and it's nothing, too much and it's wasted.

What I hope you've gathered by this point is that a chemical
weapons attack that kills a lot of people is incredibly hard to
do with military grade agents and equipment, so you can imagine
how hard it will be for terrorists.

The more you know about this stuff, the more you realize how
hard it is to use.

We'll start by talking about nerve agents.

You have these in your house. Plain old bug killer (like Raid)
is nerve agent. All nerve agents work the same way; they are
cholinesterase inhibitors that mess up the signals your nervous
system uses to make your body function.

It can harm you if you get it on your skin, but it works best if
they can get you to inhale it. If you don't die in the first
minute and you can leave the area you're probably gonna live.

The military's antidote for all nerve agents is atropine and
pralidoxime chloride. Neither one of these does anything to
cure the nerve agent; they send your body into overdrive to keep
you alive for five minutes, after that the agent is used up.

Your best protection is fresh air and staying calm. Listed
below are the symptoms for nerve agent poisoning:

Sudden headache, Dimness of vision (someone you're looking at
will have pinpointed pupils), Runny nose, Excessive saliva or
drooling, Difficulty breathing, Tightness in chest, Nausea,
Stomach cramps, Twitching of exposed skin where a liquid just
got on you.

If you are in public and you start experiencing these symptoms,
first ask yourself, did anything out of the ordinary just
happen, a loud pop, did someone spray something on the crowd?

Are other people getting sick too?
Is there an odor of new mown hay, green corn, something fruity,
or camphor where it shouldn't be?

If the answer is yes, then calmly (if you panic you breathe
faster and inhale more air/poison) leave the area and head up
wind, or, outside.

Fresh air is the best "right now antidote."
If you have a blob of liquid that looks like molasses or Kayro
syrup on you; blot it or scrape it off and away from yourself
with anything disposable.

This stuff works based on your body weight. What a crop duster
uses to kill bugs won't hurt you unless you stand there and
breathe it in real deep, then lick the residue off the ground
for while.

Remember they have to do all the work, they have to get the
concentration up and keep it up for several minutes while all
you have to do is quit getting it on you/quit breathing it by
putting space between you and the attack.

Blood agents are cyanide or arsine which affect your blood's
ability to provide oxygen to your tissue. The scenario for
attack would be the same as nerve agent.

Look for a pop or someone splashing/spraying something and
folks around there getting woozy/falling down. The telltale
smells are bitter almonds or garlic where it shouldn't be.

The symptoms are blue lips, blue under the fingernails and rapid
breathing. The military's antidote is amyl nitride and just
like nerve agent antidote, it just keeps your body working
for five minutes until the toxins are used up.

Fresh air is your best individual chance.

Blister agents (distilled mustard) are so nasty that nobody
wants to even handle it let alone use it. It's almost
impossible to handle safely and may have delayed effects of up
to 12 hours. The attack scenario is also limited to the things
you'd see from other chemicals.

If you do get large, painful blisters for no apparent reason,
don't pop them; if you must, don't let the liquid from the
blister get on any other area, the stuff just keeps on
spreading. It's just as likely to harm the user as the target.
Soap, water, sunshine, and fresh air are this stuff's enemy.

Bottom line on chemical weapons (it's the same if they use
industrial chemical spills); they are intended to make you
panic, to terrorize you, to heard you like sheep to the wolves.

If there is an attack, leave the area and go upwind, or to the
sides of the wind stream. They have to get the stuff to you and
on you. You're more likely to be hurt by a drunk driver on any
given day than be hurt by one of these attacks.

Your odds get better if you leave the area. Soap, water, time,
and fresh air really deal this stuff a knock-out-punch.

Don't let fear of an isolated attack rule your life.
The odds are really on your side.

Nuclear bombs.

These are the only weapons of mass destruction on earth.
The effects of a nuclear bomb are heat, blast, EMP, and
radiation.

If you see a bright flash of light like the sun, where the sun
isn't, fall to the ground! The heat will be over in a second.

Then there will be two blast waves, one out going and one on
it's way back.

Don't stand up to see what happened after the first wave;
anything that's going to happen will have happened in two full
minutes.

These will be low yield devices and will not level whole cities.

If you live through the heat, blast, and initial burst of
radiation, you'll probably live for a very very long time.

Radiation will not create fifty-foot tall women or giant ants
and grass hoppers the size of tanks. These will be at the most
1-kiloton bombs; that's the equivalent of 1,000 tons of TNT.

Here's the real deal. Flying debris and radiation will kill a
lot of exposed (not all) people within a half mile of the blast.

Under perfect conditions this is about a half mile circle of
death and destruction, but when it's done it's done.

EMP stands for Electro Magnetic Pulse and it will fry every
electronic device for a good distance. It's impossible to say
what and how far but probably not over a couple of miles from
ground zero is a good guess.

Cars, cell phones, computers, ATMs, you name it, all will be out
of order. There are lots of kinds of radiation, you only need
to worry about three, the others you have lived with for years.

You need to worry about "Ionizing radiation." These are little
subatomic particles that go whizzing along at the speed of
light. They hit individual cells in your body, kill the nucleus
and keep on going. That's how you get radiation poisoning, you
have so many dead cells in your body that the decaying cells
poison you.

It's the same as people getting radiation treatments for cancer,
only a bigger area gets radiated. The good news is you don't
have to just sit there and take it, and there's lots you can do
rather than panic.

First, your skin will stop alpha particles, a page of a news-
paper or your clothing will stop beta particles, you just gotta
try and avoid inhaling dust that's contaminated with atoms that
are emitting these things and you'll be generally safe from
them.

Gamma rays are particles that travel like rays (quantum physics
makes my brain hurt). They create the same damage as alpha and
beta particles, only they keep going and kill lots of cells as
they go all the way through your body.

It takes a lot to stop these things, lots of dense material; on
the other hand it takes a lot of this to kill you. Your defense
is as always to not panic. Basic hygiene and normal preparation
are your friends. All canned or frozen food is safe to eat.

The radiation poisoning will not affect plants, so fruits and
vegetables are OK if there's no dust on them (rinse them off if
there is).

If you don't have running water and you need to collect rain
water or use water from wherever, just let it sit for thirty
minutes and skim off the water gently from the top.

The dust with the bad stuff in it will settle and the remaining
water can be used for the toilet which will still work if you
have a bucket of water to pour in the tank.

Finally, there's biological warfare.

There's not much to cover here.

Basic personal hygiene and sanitation will take you further than
a million doctors. Wash your hands often, don't share drinks,
food, sloppy kisses, etc., ... with strangers.

Keep your garbage can with a tight lid on it, don't have
standing water (like old buckets, ditches, or kiddie pools)
laying around to allow mosquitoes breeding room.

This stuff is carried by vectors, that is bugs, rodents, and
contaminated material. If biological warfare is so easy as the
TV makes it sound, why has Saddam Hussein spent twenty years,
millions, and millions of dollars trying to get it right?

If you're clean of person and home, you eat well and are active,
you're gonna live. Overall preparation for any terrorist attack
is the same as you'd take for a big storm. If you want a gas
mask, fine, go get one. I know this stuff and I'm not getting
one and I told my Mom not to bother with one either (how's that
for confidence).

We have a week's worth of cash, several days worth of canned
goods and plenty of soap and water. We don't leave stuff out to
attract bugs or rodents, so we don't have them. These people
can't conceive a nation this big with this many resources.

These weapons are made to cause panic, terror, and to
demoralize. If we don't run around like sheep, they won't use
this stuff after they find out it's no fun.

The government is going nuts over this stuff because they have
to protect every inch of America. You've only gotta protect
yourself, and by doing that, you help the country.

Finally, there are millions of caveats to everything I wrote
here and you can think up specific scenarios where my advice
isn't the best. This letter is supposed to help the greatest
number of people under the greatest number of situations.

If you don't like my work, don't nit pick, just sit down and
explain chemical, nuclear, and biological warfare in a document
around three pages long yourself.

This is how we, the people of the United States, can rob these
people of their most desired goal, your terror.

SFC Red Thomas (Ret)
Armor Master Gunner
Mesa, AZ

Unlimited reproduction and distribution is authorized.
Just give me credit for my work, and keep in context.

Reprinted from www.MountainWings.com