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From: cramer@kontron.UUCP (Clayton Cramer)
Newsgroups: net.space
Subject: Re: It could have been worse.
Message-ID: <563@kontron.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 3-Mar-86 15:31:37 EST
Article-I.D.: kontron.563
Posted: Mon Mar  3 15:31:37 1986
Date-Received: Wed, 5-Mar-86 06:13:19 EST
References: <860222195435.678780@HI-MULTICS.ARPA>
Organization: Kontron Electronics, Irvine, CA
Lines: 28

> Though the present tragedy is quite nasty, consider what could have
> happened.  Let's say that the next scheduled shuttle flight exploded
> instead.  This next flight was to carry the Galileo orbiter.  This
> orbiter carrys a load of 43 pounds of Plutonium on-board.  (I may have
> the figure wrong).
> 
> Plutonium is widely felt to be the most poisonous substance anywhere,
> even if you disregard the radioactivity.  It has been said that less
> than a pound spread thinly enough could kill every human being.
> 
>     Brett Slocum

This is nonsense.  There's already vast quantities of plutonium in the
Earth's crust.  Plutonium forms naturally by U-238 atoms capturing
neutrons.  The last figures I saw quoted for plutonium concentrations in
the Earth's crust was .01 ppb.  Multiply by AT LEAST several quintillion
tons for the mass of the Earth's crust: 10^18 tons * 10^-11 = 10^7
tons of plutonium in the crust.

Also, ignoring plutonium's radioactivity (which, because of its chemical
similarity to calcium and other transition metals, causes it to concentrate
in the bones), plutonium is just another heavy metal, with pretty typical
heavy metal toxicity.  I wouldn't want to have any big chunk in my diet
(just like I wouldn't want a lot of barium in a form that would enter
my system), but to claim it's the most poisonous substance is more
nonsense from the anti-nuclear groups.  (Perhaps some of them can study
chemistry and physics one of these days, instead of taking classes in
poetics and English literature.)