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| Debka Causes Panic in NYC |
| 2007-08-11 |
| Just because a lot of Debka's stuff isn't confirmed, doesn't mean it isn't true. Ref: Iraqi WMDs to Syria) New York police stepped up security throughout Manhattan and at bridges and tunnels on Friday in response to an internet report - which authorities said they could not verify - that al-Qaeda might be plotting to detonate a dirty bomb in the city. The report triggering the security hike came from Israeli website www.Debka.com, which reported that there has been a rush of electronic chatter on al-Qaeda sites, one saying there would be an attack "by means of trucks loaded with radio-active material against America's biggest city and financial nerve center." Another al-Qaeda message mentioned New York, Los Angeles and Miami as targets, the Jerusalem-based DEBKAfile reported. New York City police said in a statement the threat against the city was an "unverified radiological threat," stressed the increased security was precautionary and said the city's alert status for an attack was unchanged at "orange." New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg stressed there was no reason to believe this threat was any different from countless others since the September 11 attacks. The New York Police Department said in a statement it had increased the deployment of radiological sensors on vehicles, boats and helicopters, and had set up vehicle checkpoints in lower Manhattan's financial district and at bridges and tunnels. Police confirmed the increased security was in response to receiving information that a dirty bomb may go off on Friday evening around 34th street in Manhattan - a neighborhood with the Empire State Building, New York City's tallest building, Madison Square Garden and Macy's department store. A spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security in Washington said the threat to New York was "unsubstantiated" and there was "no credible information telling us there is an imminent threat to the homeland at this time." New York has remained on an orange alert - the second highest such level, below red - since the September 11, 2001, attacks that destroyed the World Trade Center. |
| Posted by:Phil_B |
| #13 One of the greatest tools against dirty bombs are fire trucks : firemen in their breathers wash the area down with fire hoses. Than, and a good rain storm would reduce the true effectiveness of a dirty bomb to about zero - the panic effectiveness due to the modern phobia about anything remote dangerous would kill hundreds if not thousands. |
| Posted by: Shieldwolf 2007-08-11 16:49 |
| #12 Zenster! How diabolical! Thank you. I came up with the idea when I first arrived here at Rantburg and began examining what measures could possibly consitute a functional deterrent to terrorism. I still welcome any and all suggestions. If Islam hopes to survive, it'd damn well better hope we figure something like this out because the alternative doesn't involve their further participation. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2007-08-11 16:18 |
| #11 Zenster! How diabolical! I read in the Scientific American a few years back that the deaths from panic would far outweigh the deaths from radiation. But 'Moose's analysis is more compelling about the hazard than the article! I gave it up when the the editors could hardly allow any article to be printed without Bush- bashing. |
| Posted by: Bobby 2007-08-11 16:03 |
| #10 Great analysis, 'moose. I'd like to see who wants to sacrifice themselves grinding up a chunk of radioisotope into particles fine enough to disperse properly. Unless they're wearing a lead-lined clean room "space suit" they would probably be the only casualty the bomb ever caused. I'll repeat, hit us with a dirty bomb and we should retaliate by dusting Medina, on short or no notice, with the exact same isotope—in much larger quantities—and right before the haj. Hit us with another one after that and both Medina and Mecca get dusted right before every haj for the next five years. Same goes for anthrax or any other biological attack. Decontaminating the shrines would cost untold billions of dollars. Screwing with the haj is the one sure way to reach out and touch around 1,000,000 Muslims all at once. If they suddenly realized that their life-long dream—not to mention a huge chunk of personal earnings—all went down the toilet because some terrorist wingnut decided to mess with America, they just might go home and strangle the local radical imam. Most Muslims only get one chance to make a pilgrimage to the shrines. Ruining that once-in-a-lifetime opportunity is a sure-fire way of making Islam aware of how their constant terrorism comes with a price tag attached. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2007-08-11 15:15 |
| #9 Cause that is what we do... |
| Posted by: A Jogger 2007-08-11 14:34 |
| #8 #7 I'm in NYC ... no panic here. Posted by doc Then why are so many people running... ;-) |
| Posted by: Elmigum Gonque3914 2007-08-11 14:29 |
| #7 I'm in NYC ... no panic here. Drink up! |
| Posted by: doc 2007-08-11 13:55 |
| #6 #3 Anonymoose & #5 Crosspatch, We live in a society that thinks it'll get cancer from smelling someone else's cigarette or that grilling a steak will cause polar bears to drown. People like John Edwards have grown rich off the scientific ignorance of (some) Americans. "Dirty" bombs would be 100 times more effective than the DC Sniper even if they resulted in zero deaths. |
| Posted by: JDB 2007-08-11 13:14 |
| #5 Also keep in mind that hype in the media about "dirty bombs" only serves to INCREASE their effectiveness. Dirty bombs are practically harmless. They won't kill very many people and the radiation they release would not be harmful. It's just that they WOULD release measurable amounts of radiation and people are so terror stricken of ANY amount of radioactivity that it would require billions to decontaminate areas of levels or radiation that aren't harmful. A dirty bomb is a psychological panic weapon simply designed to scare people. Media reports like this just serve to increase the impact of them. |
| Posted by: crosspatch 2007-08-11 13:06 |
| #4 It is false 99 times out of 100. It really isn't worth reading because it is generally a waste of everyone's time to consider what they publish. Sure, every once in a while they publish something that turns out to be true but I toss that in the coincidence bin. A hundred monkeys trying at random will eventually produce a readable sentence. |
| Posted by: crosspatch 2007-08-11 13:01 |
| #3 I like to point out that dirty bombs are far more publicity than actual weapon. They have inherent technical problems that make them very difficult to effectively contaminate a wide area. To start with, the isotope selected has to be widely available, *and* it has to be of a lighter element, *and* it has to have a reasonably long half life *and* it has to be of a type easily consumed by people who will get sick from it. That means that it has to work both chemically, and emit the right kind of radiation. First you have to collect it, and in such a way that you don't contaminate yourself yet get enough to contaminate a large area--no mean feat. It has to be light enough so that when blown into the air by high explosives that it doesn't just fall right down again contaminating just a few dozen relatively easy to clean up square feet. Third, if it has a short half life, it will be gone either before you can blow it up on target, or it just won't last. And that is important, because of the publicity factor. After you would blow up such a bomb, you have to get somebody on site with Geiger counters to both verify the radiation *and* who will blab it to the media *and* to a media that will blab it to the public. Unless you create a public panic, it doesn't work. Otherwise the government can discreetly clean it up and not make a fuss. The problems just get worse and worse. If the isotope is too light, it wafts away with the next breeze; too heavy and it just sits there, to be washed away with the next rain. Most of the contamination would be on people's shoes, which means that it is just as likely to get in them as typical shoe dust--not likely in any quantity. If the isotope isn't readily absorbed by people and retained in the body, it just passes through, most likely with minimal harm. It just goes on and on. This is not to say that it can't be done, just that the odds of a typical dirt ball putting an effective dirty bomb together is pitifully small. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2007-08-11 09:31 |
| #2 "Panic." You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. |
| Posted by: Mike 2007-08-11 09:22 |
| #1 Why go to all that trouble of setting off a "dirty bomb?" All you need to paralyze NYC is heavy rain. |
| Posted by: doc 2007-08-11 08:32 |