How are people warned prior to a missile attack?

[betsy]

IT was on my status update......but this is serious folks, that I have to bring this up here.   We hardly have any air raid sirens (left from the previous war).   Japan woke up recently by the sound of blaring sirens. 

 

Looks like no one really knows the score about this:

 

Quote

 

A bit of research and I found out that most were removed by the Department of National Defence (DND) back in the 1970s because they were rusting and becoming eyesores. The Federal Government had no money to maintain them. These sirens had been installed back in the 50s as part of the cold war effort to be prepared for air raids. Those sirens would give about twenty minutes advanced warning for people to take shelter in case of an enemy attack.

Apparently there are a few left, some web sites show two in Toronto and a few in BC. DND admitted in an interview to the Toronto Star in 2007, that some may have been missed from the inventory. In fact, there was controversy as to who actually owned them.

 

The Star called the City of Toronto, who referred them to the Province, who referred them to DND, who referred them back to the City of Toronto.

 

https://oaem.ca/tag/air-raid-sirens/

 

 

The old air raid siren would've given people 20 minutes to take cover.  So, how does the government plan to warn people if a missile  is coming? 

The USA still has them, plus they use emergency broadcast system (if you've got your tv on - I suppose that will help).  They got them in Denmark, too (according to a Dane poster) - and they still do testings.

 

What about us? 

 

[dialamah]

If a nuclear missile goes off nearby, 20 minutes warning won't really help.  Sure, there's helpful articles on the internet about what to do in the case of a nuclear attack, but personally I'd rather be flash-cooked than die slowly of radiation poisoning.   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acute_radiation_syndrome

 

[Guest]

We could use a combination of the Amber alert system, and the Weather Network storm warning system.

If you get them both at the same time, get under a table immediately!  Take a bottle of water!

[The_Squid]

We have tsunami sirens.    Missiles have never really been an issue...

[DogOnPorch]

During the Cold War, there were three large sirens in the city I lived in.

Loud.

[DogOnPorch]

3 hours ago, dialamah said:

If a nuclear missile goes off nearby, 20 minutes warning won't really help.  Sure, there's helpful articles on the internet about what to do in the case of a nuclear attack, but personally I'd rather be flash-cooked than die slowly of radiation poisoning.   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acute_radiation_syndrome

 

 

Radiation comes in many forms. You can protect yourself from the vast majority of "it" by taking shelter underground with a certain amount of earth and/or concrete between you and the fallout/ionizing radiation. As well, the type of weapon and type of deployment used can greatly affect the amounts/types of radiation produced...neutron bombs...air bursts...ground bursts...fusion...fission...boosted...dirty...etc.

Atomic weapons, however, do far more than just produce radiation across the spectrum...

The visible light alone is enough to turn most combustible materials to ash (on top of the infrared light). That's instant. Then comes the over-pressure in the form of a double mach-stem wave....reflective and incident. Not much can remain upright. Another good reason to be underground.

The bad news is that a Hydrogen Bomb with a 1 megaton yield is likely to collapse any and all civilian shelters within a 20km radius...with varying results further out.  Smaller fission devices...like the ones that flattened Hiroshima and Nagasaki (20 kilotons say)...are survivable in a sturdy enough shelter and appropriate distance away from ground zero.

Post blast...the half-life of the various radioactive elements determines how hot a region remains and for how long. It can be a long wait as I'm sure you're aware.

The hypothetical Cobalt Bomb relies on the assumption that humans can't remain underground longer than 10 years...it doesn't even need to be delivered...just detonated. That would pump sufficient amounts of Cobalt-60 into the upper atmosphere that it would spread globally. On The Beach...style.

 

[betsy]

If you've got the necessary equipments ready like heavy duty plastic and staple guns or heavy duty tapes -  20 minutes gives you enough time to seal off a room.

Survival may be a long shot, or practically nil, but I think trying is better than just standing there waiting to be blown away.  You don't want to wait for that impact and the flash before you start scrambling.  The instinct to survive will kick in, and most likely we'll scramble to get away.  Oh boy.....wouldn't you be so frustrated to know that you haven't any place to go.

[betsy]

Did you see that video with Japan's air raid siren?  It's loud enough to wake you.  For something like this, I think we should have something mechanical - you don't want to rely on high-tech that can be hacked into and jammed.

I've seen emergency alert testings  on tv.  But that's good only if the tv is on.

They shouldn't use the siren that's used for tornado warnings since tornadoes often times don't materialize.  Hearing the same thing over a period of time is like hearing the boy who cried wolf.  

Edited September 16, 2017 by betsy

[bush_cheney2004]

Lots of fun stuff on the topic in this National Post story.  

You can get all the necessary materials to build a basement bunker at your local home store.

Bea Alerte !

 

 

 

http://nationalpost.com/news/canada/this-is-a-real-emergency-chilling-artifacts-from-when-canada-prepared-for-nuclear-annihilation

 

 

 

[DogOnPorch]

Uhhhhhh....vents....luv it.

[JamesHackerMP]

On 9/16/2017 at 2:37 PM, DogOnPorch said:

he bad news is that a Hydrogen Bomb with a 1 megaton yield is likely to collapse any and all civilian shelters within a 20km radius...with varying results further out.  Smaller fission devices...like the ones that flattened Hiroshima and Nagasaki (20 kilotons say)...are survivable in a sturdy enough shelter and appropriate distance away from ground zero.

Damn.  That really sucks.  So there's no point in sheltering at all if you're too close?

Of course, North Korea likely has very few hydrogen bombs.  I wouldn't bet they are "deliverable" yet since they're more complicated weapons, probably--I assume--heavier than the old-style fission bombs.  And it might not even be close to 1 megaton.  If anywhere is hit by a NK missile, it's probably not going to be a 1 megaton hydrogen bomb.

I just love how the shelter in the above diagram has "vents".  Yeah, that's just what you need to protect yourself against radiation and fallout: a vent right into the open air.  Looks like one of those plans they circulated in the 60s as a public band aid, not a really productive thing.  You need an air intake with a centrifugal blower to let in oxygen (but filter out the fallout particles) and let out the carbon dioxide.

In Switzerland, all houses built after 1960 must have government approved plans: so that they can see there is a workable fallout shelter in it.  It's required by law.

Who the hell has cobalt bombs? No point to doing it that way.

You could hear the sirens in some part of Baltimore being tested every Monday at 1:00 p.m. when I was growing up (the 1980s).  My parents carefully avoided actually telling me what it was for.  We lived right outside the city limits in the suburbs, so the siren was probably a few miles away at least.  Yeah, they'd be loud.

20 minutes should be enough to take cover---if you've got a fallout shelter.  Oh another thing, the air intake pipe I mentioned: if a hydrogen bomb produces more heat and fire, wouldn't the fire burst right into the fallout shelter and incinerate its occupants immediately?

[JamesHackerMP]

Another other thing: in a full-scale nuclear war using ICBMs with MIRVs, they don't drop one huge bomb in the middle of a target anymore: they spread out the target area (like a city) with multiple, smaller warheads.  More efficient destruction that way.  No more Fail Safe-style "20 megaton" warheads dropped in the middle of Manhattan that would do the same job but be harder to deliver.

There was a show back in 2006 called Jericho.  Any of you catch that?

Edited September 19, 2017 by JamesHackerMP

[DogOnPorch]

6 minutes ago, JamesHackerMP said:

Damn.  That really sucks.  So there's no point in sheltering at all if you're too close?

Of course, North Korea likely has very few hydrogen bombs.  I wouldn't bet they are "deliverable" yet since they're more complicated weapons, probably--I assume--heavier than the old-style fission bombs.  And it might not even be close to 1 megaton.  If anywhere is hit by a NK missile, it's probably not going to be a 1 megaton hydrogen bomb.

I just love how the shelter in the above diagram has "vents".  Yeah, that's just what you need to protect yourself against radiation and fallout: a vent right into the open air.  Looks like one of those plans they circulated in the 60s as a public band aid, not a really productive thing.  You need an air intake with a centrifugal blower to let in oxygen (but filter out the fallout particles) and let out the carbon dioxide.

In Switzerland, all houses built after 1960 must have government approved plans: so that they can see there is a workable fallout shelter in it.  It's required by law.

Who the hell has cobalt bombs? No point to doing it that way.

You could hear the sirens in some part of Baltimore being tested every Monday at 1:00 p.m. when I was growing up (the 1980s).  My parents carefully avoided actually telling me what it was for.  We lived right outside the city limits in the suburbs, so the siren was probably a few miles away at least.  Yeah, they'd be loud.

20 minutes should be enough to take cover---if you've got a fallout shelter.  Oh another thing, the air intake pipe I mentioned: if a hydrogen bomb produces more heat and fire, wouldn't the fire burst right into the fallout shelter and incinerate its occupants immediately?

 

1 minute ago, JamesHackerMP said:

Another other thing: in a full-scale nuclear war using ICBMs with MIRVs, they don't drop one huge bomb in the middle of a target anymore: they spread out the target area (like a city) with multiple, smaller warheads.  More efficient destruction that way.  No more Fail Safe-style "20 megaton" warheads dropped in the middle of Manhattan that would do the same job but be harder to deliver.

 

Vents w/o heavy filters....I also noticed. Shows a certain nativity... 

Re: the Cobalt Bomb...nobody admits to one. Israel is the likely candidate if one exists. Other elements would also work besides cobalt...but it's the preferred element in terms of half-life vs cost. Smaller versions could lay waste to continent sized areas depending on weather, etc. But like a persistent chemical weapon...the cobalt-60 (et al) would spread around. 

You are correct about smaller yields...in general. Reflective mach-stem waves collide and create even more destruction. But they still tend to be in the 100kt-1mt range which are many times larger than Hiroshima, etc. Red China still has 5 megaton ICBMs with horrible CEP...city busters only.

Nuclear Secrecy has a lot of great info on zee bomb.

http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/

Plus it has NukeMap which gives some graphics to the numbers.

http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/visualizations/

[Altai]

Trump will post a tweek to warn you. 

[scribblet]

If we were nuked or there was a war I wouldn't want to live anyway, no way to live.

[DogOnPorch]

2 minutes ago, scribblet said:

If we were nuked or there was a war I wouldn't want to live anyway, no way to live.

 

You've got that right...

http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/misc/targets1956/

[betsy]

I think that way too....I think of Mad Max world - do I really want to survive and live through that? I don't think so.

 

...however, we won't know how we're going to react if ever we know a missile is coming.  The instinct to survive might kick in.

[PIK]

On 9/16/2017 at 10:33 AM, bcsapper said:

We could use a combination of the Amber alert system, and the Weather Network storm warning system.

If you get them both at the same time, get under a table immediately!  Take a bottle of water!

I will take a bottle of scotch instead.

[Thinkinoutsidethebox]

Out here probably a mushroom cloud over the city about a hundred miles from us 

[hot enough]

On 9/16/2017 at 4:55 AM, betsy said:

The old air raid siren would've given people 20 minutes to take cover.  So, how does the government plan to warn people if a missile  is coming? 

The USA still has them, plus they use emergency broadcast system

A lot of USians are paranoid schizophrenics. As were many people who got badly duped in the Red Scare of the 1950s.

A lot of Americans can see a new deadly threat as soon as their governments say "Red" or "Orange" or "commie".

 

[PIK]

My small town had one, but they took it down around 15 yrs ago I think.

[eyeball]

On 9/16/2017 at 3:55 AM, betsy said:

How are people warned prior to a missile attack?

I'm always somewhat baffled why devoted Christians are troubled by such things given their firmly held conviction about the wonderful nature of the hereafter awaiting them. 

[betsy]

6 hours ago, eyeball said:

I'm always somewhat baffled why devoted Christians are troubled by such things given their firmly held conviction about the wonderful nature of the hereafter awaiting them. 

Then you must be baffled too why some Christians do prep, when they have firm conviction that God would see to their needs? 

It's understandable to be baffled, and to have questions, and oft times see some so-called "contradictions."  That's why there is such a thing called, Bible Study.

 

Now, let's get back to the topic.  Mind you......the king and Joseph were warned of the coming 7-year famine (through a dream), and they were instructed to do some prep.  And, remember Noah?

But we're not talking about warning from God here.......and, we're talking about in-coming.

Edited September 28, 2017 by betsy

[DogOnPorch]

20 hours ago, PIK said:

My small town had one, but they took it down around 15 yrs ago I think.

 

Yes...three I can recall in my hometown. There were several major targets due to be hit with larger devices...not sure the sirens would matter...nowhere to go.

Edited September 28, 2017 by DogOnPorch

[eyeball]

The alarms around here are for incoming tsunamis. If someone thinks to use them for a nuke everyone will probably run to high ground and get even  closer to an airburst.