Radioactive Fallout

[Tarrel]

The worsening geopolitical situation over the last few months has got me thinking again recently about the possibility of nuclear conflict. Also, hearing today that Hurricane Sandy could compromise up to 29 US nuclear installations concentrated my mind about fallout preparation and survival, since we are more or less Atlantic-facing and prevailing winds are west-to-east.

I have been giving some thoughts to an expedient fall-out shelter which I'll describe here. I'm by no means an expert, so would appreciate any views.

Our Situation:
I estimate our nearest targets are inverness City and Airport (35 miles distant) and RAF Lossiemouth (25 miles distant). In addition, Faslane is SW of us, but some 150 miles distant. Prevailing winds are SW to NE, so fallout from Faslane and Inverness could reach us.

Our home is an old stone cottage, with solid walls around 2 feet thick. One end of the house is partly below street level (between 2 and 3 feet). This end has a single bedroom with a single-glazed sash window to the outside and an interior door to the remainder of the ground floor. There is a fire place which is blocked up. This room would become the fall-out shelter.

Preparations - Modifications:
The intention would be to have ready:
- Pre-cut, drilled and white-painted thick plywood boards for securing to the exterior of the window frame.
- Gaffer tape stored in the room for air-sealing the windows
- quAntities of pillows to stuff the (18 inch wide) window return on the inside
- A home made Kearny Air Pump to be inserted into the interior door, with baffles on the inside to trap fallout particles

Preparations - Inner Refuge:
- to produce a "Protect and Survive" style lean-to refuge inside the room, using interior doors and mattresses from the beds. This would give belt-and-braces protection against fallout particles drawn into the room that then start to settle on surfaces.

Preparations - Survival Supplies (2 people):
- 100 litres of water in 4 x 25 litres jerry cans
- 1 x spare 25 litre can for storage of urine. (further storage from water containers as they become empty)
- 2 x bucket with sealed lid for defaecation
- 1 x bucket of wood-ash for covering faeces
- 1 x slop / waste bucket
- wet wipes for personal hygiene. Tooth brush and toothpaste.
- Sufficient canned food for two people x 2 weeks (to be eaten cold)
- Radio and torch and spare batteries
- Changes of clothes and sleeping bags
- books / games

The aim would be to be self-contained and self-sufficient for two weeks, with no requirement to leave the room. Sleeping, eating and resting would take place in the inner refuge. Exercise and personal hygiene would take place in the fallout room.

It should be noted that this plan assumes the house would not suffer serious blast damage, apart from windows being blown in. It is designed to deal with fallout from a variety of causes - civilian and military.

Have I missed anything obvious? Any comments or thoughts?

[NorthernRaider]

Briefly I guess you are going for an expedient filtered over pressure safe house / room all other vents, gaps etc sealed with silicone and duct tape, windows whited as anti flash measures. US sources say for hurricane sized storms the boards need to be 5/8 or preferable 3/4 marine grade ply, you need to be able to put em up quickly so you need threaded rod bolts mounted around the windows and doors in adavance so you can cover the boards in the 20 minute assumed time before fallout comes down ( Pray for airbursts)

Have you any space under your living room floor you can access for extra shelter / food & water storage.

And the good oldy, can you set up your garden hose so it sprays the roof of your cottage thus washing away any fallot that settles on the roof?

Highly reccomend
Surviving Doomsday by C Bruce Sibley (no you cant borrow mine unless you sit here and make notes from it)
Life after Doomsday by Bruce D Clayton

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Y'know once again my instincts tell me we really should try again to have a residential study weekened some place where we can talk, debate and research info from my and other folks book archives.

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Oooh look what I found on amazon

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-listing...ition=used

[Skean Dhude]

Makes sense but you really need longer than two weeks worth of food.

In addition a room that size only holds a certain amount of air, you will need to allow air in from outside or suffocate. Therefore you need a filtering system that will suck air in from outside, filter it and then allow it to escape with no possibilty of air coming in to bypass the filter itself.

In addition you need a geiger counter. No point in hiding in there when no radiation is present and then coming out just as it arrives. You need to know what is going on.

I would set up all the rooms within a house using polythene sheets and give yourself more storage space for food to allow you to live their longer and in less cramped conditions. Shouldn't be that much more difficult and inexpensive with masses of polythene.

[Straight Shooter]

look up blast valves you are going to need these 2 .......1 on inlet and 1 on outlet , you need to be underground with 5ft of earth over the top...... or bank up the earth around the house ... blast valves are for the shock waves and after suction they seal in or out automatically...... if its a bio kiss your arse goodbye ....unless you have the RIGHT filtration system .... 2k s worth

[Barneyboy]

come up to wot

[Tarrel]

Hmm.. interesting thoughts. I had thought about an additional supply of food and water to be stored outside of the fallout room (but in sealed containers) for use after the immediate danger had passed.

Geiger counter would be useful. You're right; need to know what's going on. When this plan first came to mind, I was thinking more about civilian-oriented nuclear incidents, in which case one could rely on news reports for info, but I guess it's important to plan for this not being the case (especially in a conflict situation).

Stuff I've read suggests fine air filtration is not required. Pumping the air through baffles and around 90 degree corners is enough to "scrub" it. Hence, the idea was to leave the rest of the house unprotected but closed up, allowing air to enter as it naturally does. Some particles would be present but far fewer than outside. The air pump would draw air from this source, through the baffles, shedding more particles in the process. The whole idea is to produce something that's expedient, quick and easy to do. Is this unrealistic?

[NorthernRaider]

No its not unrealistic at all, theres literally hundreds of designs for simple filters that can be made easily to with give you even just 1 atmosphere overpressure in your safe room, time to get books like I listed or do a google. Rockey Mountain SG used to have a massive archive of stuff and their was an entire section on filtration systems.

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A water shower over the house , a fine falling mist can really reduce the amount of fallout settling on your home and these can be made fromn bits of DIY plumbing kits and somethimes if you dont have good water pressure a few large water butts connected to your house system, plus a battery powered pump to spray your roof every hour or so for a few minutes.

[Tarrel]

Great idea about the water shower. Easy to set up in our case. Also, useful thoughts about the boards, in above post, too. Thanks.

[Straight Shooter]

there is no point prepping as you describe.......all that will do is give you a false sense ...thinking you have covered the bases (something is better than nothing) will be your ONLY comfort .... if you a going to do it , do it right, underground....you will be in there for 3 to 4 weeks ...look up potassium iodide ( amazon ) neclear fallout shelters....and their construction..... filtration neclear and bio .... i can build one and do all of it myself even so i am talking best part of £9000...... and if thats not enough you got to do it without anyone seeing what your doing......WELCOME TO THE CLUB if i sound pissed off ....its because i am well and truly ( with mine that is )

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for all our prepping...what if we got the event wrong ....vaporized if your a lucky bast..d...i hope my stash is found and helps somone though

[NorthernRaider]

Dont forget chaps your both looking at absolute worst case scenarios of major direct ground burst nuclear strikes near your homes, but in fact few if any military forces with such capability even use multi megaton ground burst weapons any more, they were only needed when missile and MIRV navigation systems were so innacurate that they had to use HUGE devices in a effort to hit the target.

Modern guidence systems are now so good that most nukes are in the kiloton ranges now AND more importantly they are nearly all AIR burst weapons so fallout is almost nothing, and its Heat, Blast and EMP to deal with.

The prime risk infact in the Uk is just a dity bomb, IE some camel jockey putting radioactive material around an ordinary bomb and setting it off in a city centre.

Or a leak from Chernobyl or Fukushima event is far more likely and well worth having plans for.