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About The Oregon statesman. (Salem, Or.) 1916-1980 | View Entire Issue (April 21, 1955)
Of! r SECTION 4 Classified Ads 1 Markets 1 ji)5ti) vim tmrti to A tftwli f OrtfM i r iU 1651 POUNDQD Statesman, Salem, Ors, Thui, April 21, 1955 (Sac 4-l H-Bomb Fall-Oiit Not So Scary - - Man Ai 'Sr'r - iln fill il . i , m Despite Frightening Aspects, Much Protection Available Against Atom Dust Stirred Up by Bomb (Editor's Nate: One of the most fearful terms of the atomic age is fall-out the rain of radioac tive particles that follows the ex plosion of atomic or nuclear weap ons. It is also one of the least understood terms of. the age. The following story may relieve your nightmares today and save your life tomorrow) ..By ALTON L. BLAKESLEE . Associated Press Science Reporter CHICAGO If) Fall-out seems Co be the bogeyman scare word of our times. But stop and look at it. Look with the focus of facts, say a num ber of scientists, and many of its panicky aspects vanish or look dif ferent. Fall-out really isn't mysterious or hard to understand. Why then is it frightening? . It's frightening to some people because they believe there is no protection against it. This is not true. ': -- It's frightening to some because they think an H-bomb could lay an all-inclusive carpet of radio active death over 7,000 square miles, an area almost the size of New Jersey, or of Connecticut and Rhode Island combined. Again, untrue. , It's frightening to others who see fall-out as a genetic time bomb, playing hob with heredity and dooming thousands of unborn children to death or illnesses. Ex perts disagree on how much risk there is of this. 7 i Sea of Radioactivity Fall-out scares some who . re gard radioactivity as a brand new, terrifying thing. Actually, we have always lived in a sea of natural radioactivity. ' , Every second, .5,400 radioactive potassium atoms explode in your body, giving off x-rays. So, every second do 2,160 radioactive carbon atoms. That's" -or a person weigh ing 130 pounds. A heavier person is even more radioactive. You're also bombarded from within and without by rays from radium and uranium, and by cosmic rays. You and your ancestors and chil dren are all naturally radioactive. Fall-out had nothing to do with it The new thing is that fall-out is adding to this radioactivity. The critical question 1s: How much? Dangerqusimountsnow; fiz i come : t good civilian defense system is es sential to give people instructions, to take charge. , ; , , If a bomb hit Washington, you'd have an hour's warning before the radioactive cloud passed over the Baltimore area, says Dr. J.B.H. Kuper, of Brookhaven National Laboratory of the AEC at Upton, Long; Island. ' I If you should be caught outside and dusted, you should remove your clothing, take a bath with soap 'and water. Some corn meal Kids, Hot CpffeeDon't Mix ""-'' ' . I f f ' - ' . ' 1 " j hi - 1 " 1 - lv v ?"" - ' ", ; . f. - ' I" . r -- -, , ; ' ' - , -r ' .'.', .,.; . " " ' ". . . ' I-.; , -l .-. iA , -few , 4."-- ter? Or rar. Seeds tf Paaie Fall-out is sometimes : blamed for causing floods, tornadoes, frosts and drought, for skin rash . es,- for making people feel giddy, for oittimr windshields. These ideas are nonsense. They are even dan gerous seeds of costly panic, some scientists warn. "Peot)le may be highly -vulner able to a mere threat of atomic warfare because of the sense of mystery about radiation," declared Dr. Austin Brues, director of the Division of Biological and Medical Research at Argonne National Laboratory. "The danger of panic could far exceed that of atomic war alone. There is a very thin line separating false , security from unreasoning fear, and one gets the impression that people dash back and forth across this frontier like jittery os triches: Only knowledge can broad en this line to a place where peo ple can stand. Knowledge Is Defease Knowledge about fall-out is your defense. Beein with , a bomb test A tremendous blast and heat, 'and a colorful cloud soaring high in the air. If the bomb bursts near the; ground, the cloud contains what will become fall-out dust sucked up by the explosion and made radioactive. Some of these oartkles "live" only a short time, giving off their rays and turning Into something harmless. Others can live for many years Coarse, heavier particles quick ly settle out, falling in a highly area. For a small bomb, this area may be up to 20 miles'-downwind. For an H-bomb, up to 100 or "00 miles. v Liehter stuff can float for miles, even 20 around the world before it slowly settles, or is brought down bv rain or snow. Most of this far-driftin stuff is made up of tiny balls of glass. It is vapor ized sand or m war pernaps vsDorized buildings. Disclosure that one H-bomb could dust 7.000 square miles with dangerous fall-out hit some people . with terrifying impact. The Atom- . ic Energy Commission (Atci said thi. fan-out could threaten survi val of humans within that area But manv Deonle overlooked ex acUy what the AEC said. It said fall-out would threaten humans ever that area under the worst possible circumstances and if they took no protection. It also said this fali-out would be patchy, not even. . ly distributed. Easy Protection 1 Protection is easily possible. The basement of your home could - give protection; ; so could concrete buildings. Even a fox-hole with a wooden cover would cut exoosnre to damaging radiation. The cloud would soon pass; the rain of dust Wtuld StOD. - "Get out or get under" advises Dr. James Arnold, university ' Chicago physicist. Be declares This is what can and did happen when a hot coffee pot and kids get tangled up. Mickey Parker, 1595 Berry St, (top photo) is de monstrating the danger of an accessible coffee pot, while Jackie PescheL 1245 Mill St, is shown being comforted by a nurse at Salem Memorial Hospital where he was confined for barns receiv ed when he tipped a hot coffee pot over on himself. The coffee pot is just one of the dangerous items found in the average house being j)oini&juUhjsKekly the JMarioa CouBt,Healtb depart went antf the Saleif Jumior Chamber "of Commerce, in observance of National Child Safety, Week. (Statesman Photos)' . k - v " U !' -f-f i " - x-" - i,- " ' " r'-:y I - s- J '-."- 1 Dangers for Children Lurk in U. S. Kitchens The average kitchen contains 130 square feet of potential death especially for children. , j Dr. Willard Stone, Marion Coun ty Health officer, Tuesday ' used this illustration to show mat the kitchen is the most dangerous room in the house for children. The health 'department in con junction with the- Salem Junior Chamber of Commerce is this week Lsponsoring local observance of Na tional Quid Safety Week. Purpose is to point out accident-prone areas around the home. 5 Died Accidentally In Marion County last year five children died accidentally in home and near-home areas. In Oregon more children died last year-in home tragedies than in automobile accidents. . The Child Safety committee is beaded by Robert Ooates for the Jaycees and Wade Patterson for the health department. f : It has . distributed some 6,000 pamphlets and posters, depicting safety practices, to local schools, youth groups and to Salem tner chants for distribution to patrons of toy departments and other ju venile areas. The committee also has arranged for a series of safety talks at local organization meetings. Press and radio publicity releases also are mduded as well as a film avail able for free , showing at adult groups and schools. Safety talks this week will in clude these at the Exchange Club today at noon; South Salem Cham ber of Commerce tonight, and at the Optimists Club meeting Thurs day night Dr. Stone said Tuesday- that more than 600 children die annu ally in America from home poison ing accident, and 36 per cent of these deaths are , attributable to common household items, such as bleaches, polishes, and other liq uids, Children under. 5 are more prone tp poisoning accidents. Other accidents which have taken lives include those from sharp in struments, hot scalding liquids and unguarded appliances. added to water would help scrub off particles sticking to the skin. - Afterward, you could hose down your; home. But check where the contaminated water collected. You'd have to avoid contaminated food or water canned food and water would be helpfuL Civilian Defense The severe fall-out area prob ably would have to be evacuated a task for civilian defense. A battery-powered radio could be your source of instructions. Inex pensive devices can be marketed to warn you of dangerous areas i of fallout. ' Water from, wells would be safe to drink, but reservoirs might be contaminated. There are methods to make reservoir water Safe fair ly quickly. The point is simple intelligent action and knowledge can save your life. How about the fall-out threat from Nevada bomb tests? From all bombs tested so far, we've been exposed to as much radiation, on the average, as that in Tone chest x-ray, the AEC says. Merrill Eisenbud of the AEC Health and Safety Laboratory in New York, directs the compiling of daily reports of fall-out and natural radioactivity from 89 sta tions over the country. The amount from fall-out so far? Just a fraction of the normal ra dioactivity always present, no where near enough to cause burns or sickness, he says. j Foods Radioactive : ' All foods are and have been, ra dioactive. In one quart of milk, 3,000 potassium atoms disintegrate every minute. Radium, uranium and thorium are scattered through the earth, enough so 100,000 of these atoms disintegrate each minute in every square foot of the earth's soil. Plants take up some of this radio activity, and it enters your body. You breathe radon gas from radium. , : Radioactive potassium was formed when the earth was born. Radioactive carbon is continually being made high in the air as atoms of air are bombarded by cosmic rays. The carbon drifts down, enters plants, animals and humans. So does some tritium, the triple-weight hydrogen used in H-bombs. f. woes wis natural radioactivity do us harm? No one knows for sure. An the radioactive atoms within you are only a billionth of a fraction of one per cent of all the atoms in your body. But rays from some of these atoms might hit and change the machinery of body cells to cause some cancers, according to one theory, j Fraction of Normal Eisenbud estimates that all the fall-out from all bomb tests since 1946 was enough to add 10,000 dis integrations per minute (to each square foot of soil, in this country. This would be only a fraction of normal or background radioactiv ity. The average amount of radia tion per square mile from fall-out would have to be multiplied by a million to cause detectable injury, according to Dr. John C. Bugher. director of the AEC's Division of Biology and Medicine. &narp argument comes over whether fall-out is producing bad genetic or hereditary effects. Here you can pick your own experts: Dr. A.H. Sturtevant California Institute of Technology: Fall-out is subjecting us to enough additional radiation to produce 70 American children a year with changed genes. Worldwide, at least 1,800 children born each year with cnangea genes. Most changes or mutations are harmful, : can pro duce humans constitutionally weak ened, more subject to infections and diseases. ; Dr. Ralph Singleton, Brookhav en geneticist: inere probably is a safe level of radiation, below which no genetic changes occur. Exten sive experiments with corn have shown that it takes a sizeable amount of radiation to produce mutations. Cattle severely burned by the Alamagordo, N.M., bomb in 1943 have not shown any genetic mutations. There has been no sig nificant signs of genetic effects yet among 50,000 babies born to sur vivors of the Hiroshima and Naga saki bombs. I'm more alarmed about the 35,000 automobile) deaths a year than over genetic death. think some geneticists are un duly alarmed. We need to prevent war, and if bomb tests will help do that, any small risks are justi fied. Change Unknown - Dr. Kuper. Brookhaven: There is very poor data on the incidence of human . mutations. If the rate of spontaneous change is not known; how can we know what is a significant increase? Dr. Muller, Indiana Univer sity geneticist: "It is a common fallacy that mutations produce grave visible abnormalities. Circus freaks and monsters, f hough often cited as examples, are rare. For each change obvious in the first or - second generation, hundreds are; too small or obscure to-be seen. Yet genes with unnoticed in dividual effect have important combined action." The National Academy of Sci ences recently took note of the divergent views among scientists and laymen on the nature and de gree of human dangers resulting from the use of atomic energy. Financial Backing The academy announced it will undertake a "broad appraisal of present knowledge about the ef-j fects of atomic radiation on living organisms." The study will receive the cooperation of the Atomic En ergy Commission i and ; financial backing from the Rockefeller Foundation. ' j Earlier, (the Federation of Amer ican Scientists had called on the United Nations to establish a com mission to explore and evaluate possible dangers from continued bomb tests. . Fall-out from an atomic war could be quite a different matter from fall-out spread by bomb tests. Could it destroy humanity? Not likely, most experts hold, for the radioactivity probably wouldn't be spread over all inhabited areas. ' Asked that question. Dr. J. Rob ert Oppenheimer, famed A-bomb scientist, said: "Not quite. You can Herd Inspection Action Delayed Marion County Court has de layed action on a request by Mrs. FV L. Zielinski that a' substitute herd inspector be appointed to inspect her herd. .7 The court in replying to the request, said that under a court order of 1950 those requesting a substitute herd inspector must submit a written application set ting forth exact reasons for . the request ; ' Dr. John Hanrahan is the regu lar inspector. ' . i , Stay ton Soldier On Transport SEATTLE (UP) The transport Gen. W. A. Mann arrived here Wednesday from the Far East with four Oregon residents among the servicemen on board. They are Pfc ' Norman G. Wil liams, Canyon City ; A3-c Thomas W. Godwin, Gold Beach; Cpl. Rod ney A. VV uman, Lakeview and Cpl. Douglas C. Barrow, Stayton. Italians Give Adlai Trouble ROME (ijp) An unrecognized Adlai Stevenson had a minor run in with police Wednesday before he was admitted to Premier Mario Scelba's official residence for lunch. Police guarding the residence held up Stevenson's taxi, in whiqh the 1952 Democratic presidential candidate had arrived alone, until he was able to establish his iden tity: . Stevenson said Scelba invited him to lunch when the Premier heard he was : passing through Rome on his way to a "business trip" in Africa. The Democratic leader arrived by plane from New York Tuesday night. I Fashion Designer Has Cut Wrist MIAMI BEACH, Fla. (UP)-L A 22-year-old New York fashion de signer and . wife of dancer Nick Condos, former husband of com edienne : Martha Raye, was in crit ical condition here Wednesday with a slashed wrist. Dr. Ralph Robbins said Barbara Caplin Condos-had -a . cut on her left wrist which had bled profuse ly. The doctor said the young wo man also was in a comatose con dition caused by "eight or 12 sleeping pills. ,' Condos told detectives his wife, whom he married last November in Aiken, S.C., had been ill and despondent. certainly destroy enough: of all' hu manity so that only the greatest act of faith can persuade you that what's left is human.' Fall-out could be one strong rea son why nations may avoid future war. For winds, obeying no man, could carry to the victor the dam aging fall-out from bombs which destroyed the vanquished. 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