In the last articles (Preparing for Nuclear war II) & then Revised Scenario I outlined what I consider to be likely scenarios for nuclear war. In this article, I want to start looking at some specifics. In particular what can be done to improve our chances of survival.
The Flash: duck and cover
The intense heat of the flash, is the most obvious start of a nuclear event. It is also the one thing that we can do most to protect ourselves against, because it doesn’t need complex shelters. The reason it is critical to protect from the flash, rather than initial radioactivity, is because if you are in the area where the initial radioactive radiation causes serious injury, you are also in the area where you are very likely to die from the blast wave. So, protecting yourself from the radioactivity, doesn’t help you survive, when the blast wave will get you.
If you are in the area where blast wave is killing people, the flash will be intense, the radiation will be intense, and you will likely be buried in rubble and die. Everything is against you. So unless you are lucky enough to be an extremely well made shelter before the blast, in the area where the direct radioactivity is an issue you are highly likely to die in the blast or shortly after.
However, if you are outside the area where the blast kills, you will survive, unless you get serious burns by the intense heat of the flash or suffer fallout. But since fallout mostly affects people downwind, it’s the flash that is the one single biggest factor for most people.
Unfortunately, the flash will cause serious life threatening burns over an extremely large area with a radius of 10s of kilometres. Whilst bigger bombs affect a much bigger area, on the “plus” side, the bigger the blast, the longer the “flash” and the more simply hitting the ground (“duck and cover”) can reduce your flash burn injuries.
So learn to HIT THE DECK … DO IT NOW!
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