Comment by stackghost
18 hours ago
Exposure to a nuclear blast doesn't necessarily make things radioactive. Hiroshima and Nagasaki are not radioactive wastelands. Even in Chernobyl, the other reactors continued to operate for a time after the accident, and nature is thriving.
But, the radiation detector is on the upper surface of the rear fuselage. Hypothetical Beta particles from the ground will strike the underside of the aircraft and not the detector.
> Exposure to a nuclear blast doesn't necessarily make things radioactive
Isn’t this neutron activation?
Generally they are going to airburst to cause maximum damage over an area which means what free neutrons hit are gasses which dispurse pretty quickly. Ground detonation does cause more fallout though.
It is, but a) it's a probabilistic process and b) most of the products decay rapidly, down to the background level in a matter of days.
Strontium-90 is a major component of fallout and strongly in the ‘really not good for you’ category.
Nothing I wrote refutes that
fallout is present in dust in the air. it’s radiation would not be coming only from below the helicopter.
4 replies →