At 11:05 AM 7/25/2001 -0400, Trei, Peter wrote: > Bill Stewart writes: > > > Meanwhile of course, any foreign terrorist that wants to nuke the US > > with a physically small weapon only needs to pack it in cocaine > > and bring it in with the regular shipments, > > while Rogue Nations that can only make large Fat Boy style weapons > > need cruder methods, like bribing a crane operator to load the wrong > > container on a ship bound for New York or Los Angelese harbor. > > > > >It may not be that easy. My understanding (based on various TV programs >broadcast back in the early 90's) is that there is a program called 'NEST', >which stands for something like Nuclear Emergency (mumble) Team, >tasked with dealing with this type of problem. > >One protection hinted is that strategically chosen points of transit >(bridges, >ports, tunnels, major highways, mail, baggage and freight facilities, etc) >have >detectors for nuclear materials. > >The thing is, while you can sheild a source to the point where it is not >a hazard, sheilding it to the point of *undetectability* is far harder task. > >If you detect even a single gamma ray of a certain frequency, or >betas or even alphas of certain energies, you *know* that a certain >isotope produced them. If the detectors note the presence of a >certain isotopes, they generate the appropriate alarms. > >There are also other detection systems - I've seen X-rays of entire >container trucks which were passing through the Chunnel - illegal >immigrants were quite visible inside the container. > >An attacker's best chance would be to place his weapon in a >container, heavily sheilded, and then to bury that in the middle of >a stack of other containers of heavy shielding in the hold of a >container ship, and plan to detonate it while still on board in a >target harbor. Or reduce the effectiveness of the detection system by clandestinely "salting" vessels entering our ports with radio active dust with the same energy signatures. Sort of a radio active chaff. steve