To: rhoffman@animatedsoftware.com
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Date: Sun, 26 Sep 1999 18:22:53 +0300
Subject: Nuclear powered space missions
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Dear Mr. Hoffman,
I've been following your crusade against nuclear powered space missions for some time. Although a few of your points are undoubtedly valid, I still can't accept such all-out opposition to ALL those spacecraft, which use the nuclear power or are being designed to do so. While there are missions, which for sure can use the solar power, it is for sure too that there are and will be missions, which are totally out of question without RTG's or some other form of a nuclear power source. Let's see a few examples:
1. Europa Orbiter, while being close enough to the Sun to use REALLY BIG solar panels, will, nevertheless, fly very deep into the Jupiter's radiation belts and spend enough time there to make solar panels unfeasible because they will be destroyed by the radiation in a very short time. RTG's, due to their very nature, are completely insensitive to this type of hazard. Having said all this, Europa is probably the most interesting and important object to explore in the entire solar system because if it is proven that there is liquid water under its icy surface, Europa will turn out to be the only body in the solar system, except for Earth, to have water, and thus some probability of harbouring life.
2. Planet Pluto, the main target of Pluto-Kuiper Express mission is 32 times farther form the Sun than Earth is. At such distance, there is no hope to power the spacecraft with anything but RTG's, especially given the duration of the mission (8-10 years). Pluto is the last "white spot", so to speak, in our solar system, which haven't been seen from a short distance by the humankind. If we can use Voyager 2 mission to Uranus and Neptune to make a guess, the discoveries, which PKE will make at Pluto, most likely will be spectacular and well worth the long wait. Besides, PKE must be launched soon, so that the flyby takes place no later that 15-20 years from now because it is predicted that the atmosphere of Pluto will freeze out on its surface (because Pluto is currently moving away from the Sun) and obscure any surface details, and it will be impossible to study the atmosphere itself, too. After that, our next chance to study Pluto will come no earlier than 200+ years from now. So, you see, that it is important to get this mission from the ground really soon, without any wait for possible new technologies.
3. If Europa Orbiter confirms the liquid water beneath the Europa's surface, there is no doubt that a more complex mission to Europa will be the top priority. Such mission, most likely to land on Europa and melt a probe through the ice layer, will have to be powered by RTG's. The probe too will use the heat from the decay of Pu-238 to melt through the ice. The result may be the discovery of some sort of life on Europa - a result of monumental importance for the entire mankind.
4. Any future orbiter mission(s) to Uranus and/or Neptune will require the use of ion engines to achieve the necessary delta-v. To power such engines even in great distances from the Sun, most likely, some kind of a space nuclear reactor (similar to Russian Topaz) will be necessary. Still, after we have flown by these planets, the next logical step to broaden our knowledge about them is to place spacecraft in the orbits around the both.
As you can see, there are many important and promising missions, which have to be completely wiped out to satisfy your anti-nuclear policies. I don't think this is the price worth to achieve your goals. Instead, I believe, that you would achieve more goals with a constructive approach towards this problem. I, too, am not very enthusiastic towards launching Pu-238 in space by a ton. Neither I consider the Earth flybys by this type of spacecraft a something to cheer about.
Speaking about Galileo and Cassini, I should point out that the Earth flyby was not included in any of these missions when they were designed. It became necessary only when, after the Challenger disaster, it was forbidden to fly the H2/O2 fuelled Centaur stage on the Shuttle, and both missions had to settle down for different launch vehicles. This resulted in much lower initial delta-v, and the necessity to make up the deficit by several Venus/Earth flybys. So, you can't accuse NASA of having such flybys as a constant part of its missions. Also, both Galileo and Cassini are pretty old designs, not using the latest technology, and, as a consequence, both are big, heavy and with high energy consumption. As a result of Challenger, these missions are many years past their timeline and very much over their initial budgets. Yet, it would be very unwise to scrap them, and lose all those billions and the work of thousands of people already spent on these projects. So NASA had to take some risk this time.
But you have to notice that there recently had been some changes in NASA policy towards this kind of missions.
They are:
1. The future spacecraft will consume much less energy and the future RTG's will be much more efficient, thus requiring only a minute amounts of Pu-238 (about 1/10 of the amount required for Cassini) to satisfactory do their job. The RTG's will, no doubt, have more advanced and failure proof designs too.
2. There are no Earth flybys by a nuclear powered spacecraft planned by NASA in the foreseeable future.
These changes in NASA policy can be attributed, at least in some part, to the activities of the people like you. Still, if you will rather cooperate with NASA instead of only criticising it and having a total elimination of all nuclear powered missions as your main goal, I sincerely believe that you will achieve more, and the space exploration and the safety of humankind will both benefit from that.
Regards - Andrejs Jansons.
Space exploration supporter.
Riga, Latvia.
PS. Excuse me for my imperfect English.
----- END OF FIRST LETTER FROM ANDREJS JANSONS -----
His English is amazingly accurate in the middle of the "scientific" statements. Almost as if someone had written the questions for him! -- rdh
----- MY RESPONSE TO ANDREJS JANSONS' FIRST EMAIL: -----
Dear Sir,
Thank you for your email (shown below). Your letter is very thought-provoking, greatly appreciated, and it deserves serious attention, which I will give it in the next few days and present your letter and my answer in an upcoming newsletter. However, I can tell you this: Your description of 1/10th of the amount of plutonium on board Cassini as a "minute" amount is absurd.
If you can argue against THAT (prove to me that 1/10th of what Cassini had on board is a "minute" amount of plutonium), then your letter will carry far, far more weight. It would not be a "minute" amount at all. It would be about 27,000,000,000 "potentially lethal doses" of plutonium (defined in newsletter #70, and discussed in more detail in several others (see #84, for example)).
I suggest you start clarifying your position by answering, as best you can, my "Cassini Quiz" shown below. If you send in your answers before I have had I chance to prepare my complete response to your original letter, then I'll publish your answers along with your letter and my finished and more detailed response.
If for some reason you do not care to answer The Cassini Quiz, then you should still consider yourself obligated to at least answer these two questions: 1) If Cassini's 72.3 pounds of plutonium (mostly Pu 238, with some Pu 239 and small amounts of other isotopes) was not enough to make you worry, then what number would be? 723 pounds? You say "tons". If Cassini carried 2,000 pounds of plutonium 238, Woody Smith would undoubtedly argue that at least that gets 2,000 pounds of Pu off the Earth (he will conveniently forget about launch accidents, as apparently, you have).
So that is my first question: What amount DOES scare you?
My second question is this: 2) If Cassini, Galileo, the Pioneer probes, the SNAP-9A (which failed), all our other nuclear launches, and all Russia's nuclear launches (many of which are still in orbit about the Earth, and others of which have failed and returned to Earth -- what do you plan to do about them?) are not enough to make you question the sanity of allowing the foxes to continue to guard the hen house, and make you question the sheer volume of launches (the rate of nuclear launches is expected to go UP, not down, even if the amount per launch is expected to go down a little), then I ask you: What level of launches of "1/10th of the amount on Cassini" would frighten you (at the current rate of failure, which has remained pretty much constant for about three decades)? One nuclear launch every month, somewhere in the world? One every week? Every day? Hourly? Woody Smith would undoubtedly like that, since after all, it would work to get the stuff off the planet (but he will conveniently forget about the failure rate of the rockets (as, apparently, have you), which is strange considering he's a historian for NASA and should know better).
Anyway, without further adieu, here is The Cassini Quiz which will show me how much you actually know about "the other side of the coin", namely the dangers of the poison you promote. Knowing how much you know about that will make it much easier for me (and others) to judge your ability to balance the various considerations fairly.
Sincerely,
Russell D. Hoffman
Founder and Editor
STOP CASSINI newsletter (soon to be renamed)
Attachment: 44 Cassini Questions every pro-nuclear scientist should be able to answer:
[ The 44-question version of the quiz can be found in STOP CASSINI newsletter #194 -- rdh ]
----- END OF MY RESPONSE TO ANDREJS JANSONS' FIRST EMAIL -----
(2) From the mailbag: A message from Latvia (part #2):
----- SECOND LETTER FROM ANDREJS JANSONS: -----
X-Lotus-FromDomain: SWH TECHNOLOGY
Dear Sir,
Thank you for your email (shown below). Your letter is very
thought-provoking, greatly appreciated, and it deserves serious attention,
which I will give it in the next few days and present your letter and my
answer in an upcoming newsletter.
Dear Mr. Hoffman,
Thanks for your reply. I'm glad that you have found my letter interesting
and worth your attention.
However, I can tell you this: Your
description of 1/10th of the amount of plutonium on board Cassini as a
"minute" amount is absurd.
Perhaps, the word "minute" is not fully applicable here, because it
doesn't express what exactly I wanted to say. ANY amount of plutonium
is dangerous and must be treated with a great respect. What I meant,
is that at any time it is MUCH SAFER to deal with 1 kg of Pu-238 than
with 10 kg.
If you can argue against THAT (prove to me that 1/10th of what Cassini had
on board is a "minute" amount of plutonium), then your letter will carry
far, far more weight. It would not be a "minute" amount at all. It would
be about 27,000,000,000 "potentially lethal doses" of plutonium (defined in
newsletter #70, and discussed in more detail in several others (see #84,
for example)).
I think that there is some error in this number. 27,000,000,000 was attributed
to Cassini. Since we speak about 1/10 of Pu-238 quantity, we should use
2,700,000,000 instead, which still is, of course, exaggerated.
This example, although theoretically sounds true, nevertheless, assumes
that all plutonium is equally distributed amongst 2,700,000,000 people, and
each of them receives exactly the same deadly dose. This will never
happen in reality, certainly not in the case of the RTG accident during
a spacecraft launch.
What is the real number of potential deaths? No one knows for sure, but
that can be in the range of several thousands over the next few decades after
the accident. In that time countless more people will die from car accidents,
plane crashes, street crime, environment pollution, hunger, armed conflicts,
and other menaces that we are constantly facing. Our world is a dangerous
place to live, let's face it. RTG should be considered unacceptable only if
they make it significantly more dangerous, which is not true.
But the amount of Pu-238 in each given RTG must be AS SMALL AS
PRACTICALLY POSSIBLE AND PROTECTED AS MUCH AS WE CAN
PROTECT IT, without making the devices impractical.
That far I completely agree with you.
I suggest you start clarifying your position by answering, as best you can,
my "Cassini Quiz" shown below. If you send in your answers before I have
had I chance to prepare my complete response to your original letter, then
I'll publish your answers along with your letter and my finished and more
detailed response.
If for some reason you do not care to answer The Cassini Quiz, then you
should still consider yourself obligated to at least answer these two
questions: 1) If Cassini's 72.3 pounds of plutonium (mostly Pu 238, with
some Pu 239 and small amounts of other isotopes) was not enough to make you
worry, then what number would be? 723 pounds? You say "tons".
I didn't say that Cassini's 72.3 pounds of plutonium didn't worry me. This
amount of Pu-238 was indeed quite high. When I said "by a ton", I meant
exactly that, and that we should use as small as possible amounts of
this substance for the future space missions.
If Cassini
carried 2,000 pounds of plutonium 238, Woody Smith would undoubtedly argue
that at least that gets 2,000 pounds of Pu off the Earth (he will
conveniently forget about launch accidents, as apparently, you have).
So that is my first question: What amount DOES scare you?
If the amount is as small as possible (no more than a couple of kg) and it has
an adequate protection in case of a launch accident, it doesn't scare me
too much (no, I haven't forgot about the launch accidents). This is the risk,
I am prepared to trade for the wonders of the outer space.
My second question is this: 2) If Cassini, Galileo, the Pioneer probes,
the SNAP-9A (which failed), all our other nuclear launches, and all
Russia's nuclear launches (many of which are still in orbit about the
Earth, and others of which have failed and returned to Earth -- what do you
plan to do about them?) are not enough to make you question the sanity of
allowing the foxes to continue to guard the hen house, and make you
question the sheer volume of launches (the rate of nuclear launches is
expected to go UP, not down, even if the amount per launch is expected to
go down a little), then I ask you: What level of launches of "1/10th of the
amount on Cassini" would frighten you (at the current rate of failure,
which has remained pretty much constant for about three decades)? One
nuclear launch every month, somewhere in the world? One every week? Every
day? Hourly? Woody Smith would undoubtedly like that, since after all, it
would work to get the stuff off the planet (but he will conveniently forget
about the failure rate of the rockets (as, apparently, have you), which is
strange considering he's a historian for NASA and should know better).
As I said before, only those missions should use RTG's, which would
have been absolutely impossible without them.
Anyway, without further adieu, here is The Cassini Quiz which will show me
how much you actually know about "the other side of the coin", namely the
dangers of the poison you promote.
I do not promote Pu-238 because it is a poison (and "promote" is a wrong
word here, anyway), but because it is the only way, at least for now, how
we can get certain missions accomplished.
Knowing how much you know about that
will make it much easier for me (and others) to judge your ability to
balance the various considerations fairly.
Sincerely,
Russell D. Hoffman
Attachment: 44 Cassini Questions every pro-nuclear scientist should be
able to answer:
FORTY-FOUR CASSINI QUESTIONS:
(1) How many RTGs (Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators) are there on
Cassini?
3
(2) How many GPHSs (General Purpose Heat Sources) are there in each RTG?
18
(3) How many GISs (Graphite Impact Shells) are there in each GPHS?
2
(4) How much plutonium is there in each one?
About 300 g.
(5) How many LWRHUs (Light Weight Radioactive Heater Units, also known
simply as RHUs) are there on board Cassini (roughly, since I'm not sure
NASA ever gave a final exact figure)?
From 130 to 160 (Cassini + Hygens).
(6) How much plutonium is there in each one?
2.7 g
(7) What was the likelihood, according to NASA, that the LWRHUs would
incinerate in a Cassini reentry accident?
From 0% to 100%, depending on how each particular unit is
oriented and tumbling during its reentry.
(8) What is the maximum percentage of plutonium which NASA EXPECTED to be
vaporized in a reentry accident, according to page 4-51 of the June 1995
Environmental Impact Statement for the Cassini mission?
About 34%.
(9) What's the which minimum EXPECTED to be vaporized, according to that
same page?
A little bit smaller than the number quoted above.
(10) What particle size range and mean can be expected from a vaporization,
if it is approximately the same as for the reentry which occurred in April
1964 which provided actual data regarding the vaporization characteristics
of plutonium?
20 - 66% - less than 10 microns,
(11) What particle size is ideal for lodging permanently in a person's lung
if it is inhaled?
10 microns and less in size.
(12) How much radiation do the cells around a particle of plutonium
receive, according to the late Dr. Karl Z. Morgan and related to me in a
conversation in 1997, which I described in a statement published in a NASA
Cassini document?
About 1000 REM/year.
(13) How many Curies of plutonium did SNAP-9A carry?
About 17,000.
(14) What chance of reentry did NASA give for SNAP-9A?
1 in 10,000,000.
(15) Did the SNAP-9A reenter Earth's atmosphere?
Yes, over Madagascar, following the launch failure.
(16) How many Curies are there in 2.1 lbs plutonium, assuming the mix is
the same as for NASA's radioactive thermoelectric generators?
About 17,000, since that is the exact amount of Pu-238 in the SNAP-9A unit.
(17) How much plutonium was on board Russia's Mars '96?
About 0,25 kg.
(18) Where is it now?
In the Pacific Ocean near the Chilean coast, or in the Chilean mountains,
depending on the exact reentry trajectory after the upper stage
failure. It still hasn't been found, AFAIK.
(19) How much plutonium was on board Apollo 13?
About 4 kg in SNAP-27 RTG.
(20) Where is it now?
On the bottom of the Tonga Trench in the Pacific.
(21) Can you prove it's there? Have you seen it? Has anyone seen it?
While no one has seen it, the ballistics of Aquarius (A13 LEM) reentry
points to the Tonga Trench as the location of its impact. However, we can
say for sure that if it is there, it isn't broken because all measurements
have shown no increase of radiation in that area.
(22) What were NASA's official odd's against a Space Shuttle failure prior
to the Challenger accident?
1 in 100,000.
(23) What were NASA's official odds on the same thing shortly after the
Challenger accident?
1 in 76.
(24) What is the half-life of Pu 236?
2.87 years.
(25) What is the half-life of Pu 238?
88 years.
(26) What is the half-life of Pu 239?
24,000 years.
(27) What is the half-life of Pu 240?
6,500 years.
(28) What is the half-life of Pu 241?
14 years.
(29) What is the half-life of Pu 242?
37 600 years.
(30) For the next seven questions, the launch weight percentage may be given:
(31) What percentage of Cassini's plutonium is Pu 236?
Trace quantities.
(32) What percentage of Cassini's plutonium is Pu 238?
About 90%.
(33) What percentage of Cassini's plutonium is Pu 239?
About 10%.
(34) What percentage of Cassini's plutonium is Pu 240?
Very small amount.
(35) What percentage of Cassini's plutonium is Pu 241?
Very small amount.
(36) What percentage of Cassini's plutonium is Pu 242?
Very small amount.
(37) What percentage of the RTG fuel is oxygen?
About 30%.
(38) What kind of radiation does plutonium 238 give off?
Mostly alpha particles.
(39) What is an alpha particle?
A helium nucleus, consists of 2 protons and 2 neutrons.
(40) If inhaled or ingested, is an alpha-emitter dangerous?
Yes, most dangerous when inhaled. The danger from
ingestion is relatively small.
(41) If so, why?
A small particles can lodge in lungs and are virtually
non-removable.
(42) What health effects does plutonium cause?
Cancer, if inhaled in small amounts, and the radiation
sickness, if a large amount is contacted for a longer time.
(43) How much plutonium 239 is considered by most people in medical science
to be a fatal dose, because it will almost surely cause lung cancer if
lodged permanently in a lung?
About 28 micrograms.
(44) How much Pu 238 would it take to have the same radiological effect?
About 1/280 of the fatal dose of Pu-239, since Pu-238 is 280 times more
radioactive.
Regards - Andrejs Jansons.
Riga, Latvia.
Goodness! This is SERIOUS! Someone actually had a go at the "Cassini Quiz"! -- rdh
Dear Sir:
Thank you very much for your followup email (shown below). Here are some specific comments:
1) 1/10th as much is precisely 1/10th safer (assuming basically the same containment system and circumstances). NOT "MUCH SAFER" as you put it. You exaggerated terribly with your "minute" reference, and your "MUCH SAFER" statement is also an exaggeration, though perhaps not as much.
2) 270,000,000,000 is the correct figure for Cassini, NOT 27,000,000,000 which is for "1/10th" of what Cassini had. Furthermore if you doubt the number, you can determine one yourself from the available medical literature and present it and how you arrived at it. How I developed that number was given in the newsletters I referenced you to. And it did not concern 2,700,000,000 people. It was just a statement of how much plutonium we are talking about. You are mixing up all sorts of numbers.
What is the real potential number of deaths? You say "no one knows for sure". Well, then the precautionary principal takes effect. Our world is indeed a dangerous place to live in, but hiding additional deaths amongst those already occurring does not excuse you from killing people.
I agree that perhaps the RTGs were "AS SMALL AS PRACTICALLY POSSIBLE AND PROTECTED AS MUCH AS WE CAN PROTECT IT" but that doesn't mean enough was done to make the operation reasonably safe or in line with other dangers we face in life. It is a simple statement to say we did the best we could with available technology. What is needed here is a recognition that the best wasn't good enough.
Referring now to your answers to the Cassini Quiz, which I appreciate:
#12: 1,000 is wrong. 10,000 is the correct figure. It was not expressed as "per" any particular unit of time. I have seen others use the same figure, also not expressed per any unit of time. (For example, that same value is given in The Atomic Bomb Movie by Peter Kuran.)
#20, #21: How do you know? How many overflights were made to find that plutonium? Where are the records of those flights? What are the names of the people who searched for the evidence? Were they sworn to tell the truth to the public? Where was their equipment last calibrated prior to the flights?
#40: How dangerous? We need a VERY EXACT NUMBER in order for all NASA's other numbers to be able to be put in perspective.
#41: You forgot to mention that small particles are not only virtually non-removable, but you can't even find them inside a living human's body.
#42: You forgot to mention leukemia and birth defects. These are the major health effects but others also occur.
Also, I have added six more questions since I realized I was letting people off too easy. I must ask you to answer these as well, but FIRST your answer to #40 must be much more exact:
(45) If two people each receive a dose of plutonium, but one receives 1000 times less than the other of the exact same radioisotopic composition (a theoretical statement, of course, for just as no two snowflakes are ever exactly alike, no two particles of mixed plutonium isotopes will be exactly alike), what would the relative chance that the person who receives the lower dose will suffer a health effect, compared to the chance that the person who receives the higher dose will suffer a health effect?
(46) It is a given that the rate at which health effects occur in a given population decreases as the dosage of radioactive particles which have been inhaled or ingested is decreased. But, will there be any difference in the TYPES of health effects either of the individuals cited in the above question might suffer?
(47) Is there such a thing as a mild form of cancer, leukemia, or birth defect? Or are they all, at best, survivable or non-survivable horrors?
(48) If NASA were to announce that future space missions would use only 1/10th as much plutonium as Cassini used, do you think this would reduce the risks to a reasonable level, if at the same time NASA tripled the number of launches and five other countries also began launching nuclear missions as well, because NASA's arrogance gave those other nations legal precedent for using so-called "peaceful space exploration missions" to get rid of some of their nuclear waste?
(49) Over approximately the past 4 decades, rockets from all nations capable of launching them have failed to achieve orbit, or have failed to escape Earth's gravitational field, or have failed at some other point, at a fairly constant (and alarming) rate. Approximately what is that rate?
(50) What's your favorite color of cancerous tumor?
In summary, we are no closer to being able to discuss real numbers now than before. You continue to deny the dangers from a Cassini accident and you describe there being "some error" in a number you have already knocked down to 1/10th of what it should be, before taking away another 1/10th (the proper 1/10th) for your new-and-improved RTGs.
And we haven't even started to explore what you know (or don't know) about the physics and statistical properties of plutonium dispersal in the environment (a good newsletter to see is #147, item #3 (A pro-Cassini Astronomer's comments, plus my response). You need to fully understand the uptake of plutonium by plants and animals which are then eaten by humans, for instance. What do you know about that? (It's called bioaccumulation.) Redistribution by the natural processes of evaporation and rainfall? Where is that discussed in your calculations of where all the plutonium will go in a planet with 6,000,000,000 people on it?
Furthermore, you don't seem to know that the baseline studies NASA and everyone uses for radiation damage contain numerous points where there could be -- indeed, undoubtedly are -- orders-of-magnitude errors which lowered the apparent risk (this is discussed in detail in newsletter #164, the first item).
And you have also not mentioned NASA's use of the Price-Anderson Act to insure Cassini, which meant that even if Cassini had crashed into poverty-stricken Africa, for example, in a late launch accident, America would have paid out only $100,000,000 in total to cover the costs that would have occurred. (Of course, they would have denied all cancers under the plume were theirs, anyway.) What say you to that insurance scam? Do you consider that to be a responsible thing do to, risking all those cancers, and then promising not to pay for them ($100,000,000 would barely buy the equipment for one modern emergency room, let alone pay for the suffering deaths of millions of people)?
I thank you for your answers, but we are barely ahead of where we were. You say you would treat "ANY" quantity plutonium "with a great respect". I do not see that respect in anything you have said, except perhaps where you admit that Cassini's 72.3 pounds of Pu dioxide was "indeed quite high". Does that mean you wrote to Daniel Goldin and told him that's how you felt? If so please show me the letter! If that was "quite high" would twice that amount have been abhorrent to you? Five times that amount? You still are putting no real numbers into this discussion.
Thank you, however, for your attempts. Perhaps we will be able to determine exactly what you are saying from your followup letter, which I hope will arrive soon. In any event I do believe you are trying to have an honest discussion about the issues, which is more than just about anyone else from your camp has ever tried to do. I do truly appreciate it.
Sincerely,
Russell Hoffman
That'll get the conversation moving, I thought. I was wrong. It killed it, at least at first: -- rdh
Dear Sir,
I have been awaiting your completion of the final six questions of my "Cassini quiz". I hope the delay is due to your realizing how hard they are to answer, but that your efforts are sincere.
You can skip the last one if you like, of course.
Sincerely,
Russell Hoffman
----- THIRD LETTER FROM ANDREJS JANSONS: -----
X-Lotus-FromDomain: SWH TECHNOLOGY
Dear Sir,
I have been awaiting your completion of the final six questions of my
"Cassini quiz". I hope the delay is due to your realizing how hard they
are to answer, but that your efforts are sincere.
You can skip the last one if you like, of course.
Sincerely,
Russell Hoffman
P. S. I have formulated much of my response to your original letter (in
fact, I even discussed details with a reporter here last week).
Dear Mr. Hoffman,
I have to apologize, because I had been so busy all last week
in my office (we are finishing a project), and that's the only place
where I have access to PC and Internet. If you won't mind, I'll try
to write you a reply to your last letter by the end of this week.
Regards - Andrejs Jansons.
Riga, Latvia.
PS. Please feel free to publish my previous letters whenever you
want, without awaiting my response to the last one.
How generous. -- rdh
Dear Sir,
Thanks for your email, and I will also be preparing my more detailed response for you at the same time. I appreciate your continuing the dialogue and I'm sure many will be interested in reading it when it's ready. I may indeed publish what we have so if I get a chance this week (Y2K awaits impatiently, you know!).
Yours,
Russell
Here, Mr. Jansons drops the ball, which we figured would happen sooner or later. The "hard questions" remain unanswered. -- rdh
X-Lotus-FromDomain: SWH TECHNOLOGY
b> Dear Sir:
Dear Mr. Hoffman,
I finally got the time to write a reply to your last letter. I
hope, you wouldn't mind the delay, which was caused by
me being extremely busy all last week.
Thank you very much for your followup email (shown below). Here are some
specific comments:
1) 1/10th as much is precisely 1/10th safer (assuming basically the same
containment system and circumstances). NOT "MUCH SAFER" as you put
it. You exaggerated terribly with your "minute" reference, and your "MUCH
SAFER" statement is also an exaggeration, though perhaps not as much.
Well, we can discuss is 10 times "much" or "not much", but I should say
that the reduced mass of Pu-238 also means that more from the RTG total
mass can be spent to make the canisters more sturdy and better shielded, which
should considerably increase the safety of the entire system, more than only
the safety gain from the reduced mass itself. The reduced mass also will
be more compact, thus lowering the chance of breaking up in a launch
accident.
2) 270,000,000,000 is the correct figure for Cassini, NOT 27,000,000,000
which is for "1/10th" of what Cassini had. Furthermore if you doubt the
number, you can determine one yourself from the available medical
literature and present it and how you arrived at it. How I developed that
number was given in the newsletters I referenced you to. And it did not
concern 2,700,000,000 people. It was just a statement of how much
plutonium we are talking about. You are mixing up all sorts of numbers.
Oops, my fault. I didn't notice that you already reduced the number 10
times in your letter. Sorry.
What is the real potential number of deaths? You say "no one knows for
sure". Well, then the precautionary principal takes effect. Our world is
indeed a dangerous place to live in, but hiding additional deaths amongst
those already occurring does not excuse you from killing people.
The real question is - how many more additional deaths a possible
plutonium release will cause? If that number is negligibly small, when
compared to the number of deaths caused by, let's say, car crashes
over the same period, then we have to take some action against the use
of cars before we start to worry about plutonium. You would say that all
those people themselves voluntarily decided to drive cars, and thus
are fully aware of the risks they are taking. Here I would disagree.
First, as an American, could you imagine your own life without a car?
As far as I know, all American infrastructure is built around cars, so
a person without a car is almost helpless, at least in the areas away
from the big cities. Can you say that such person drives its car voluntarily?
And second, even if you don't drive a car (like me), we still take a risk of
being struck by a passing car each an every time we have to cross a street
or road. If the risk of me being killed by a car is, say, 100 times higher
than the risk of me dying after being exposed to Pu-238 from an RTG
launch accident, then I consider that risk acceptable, and I don't think
that the real risk is significantly larger.
I agree that perhaps the RTGs were "AS SMALL AS PRACTICALLY POSSIBLE AND
PROTECTED AS MUCH AS WE CAN PROTECT IT" but that doesn't mean enough was
done to make the operation reasonably safe or in line with other dangers we
face in life. It is a simple statement to say we did the best we could
with available technology. What is needed here is a recognition that the
best wasn't good enough.
Again, how much protection do you consider "good enough"? 10 times
better? 1000 times better? Is there really a limit? If there is no
limit (no device can be 100% safe, no matter how it is designed), should
we stop to use this technology, if there is no alternative technology for
certain space missions, and we don't know when, if at all, such alternative
technology may be available?
Referring now to your answers to the Cassini Quiz, which I appreciate:
#12: 1,000 is wrong. 10,000 is the correct figure. It was not expressed
as "per" any particular unit of time. I have seen others use the same
figure, also not expressed per any unit of time. (For example, that same
value is given in The Atomic Bomb Movie by Peter Kuran.)
#20, #21: How do you know? How many overflights were made to find that
plutonium? Where are the records of those flights? What are the names of
the people who searched for the evidence? Were they sworn to tell the
truth to the public? Where was their equipment last calibrated prior to
the flights?
#40: How dangerous? We need a VERY EXACT NUMBER in order for all NASA's
other numbers to be able to be put in perspective.
Since it is much less dangerous (by orders of magnitude, as you state
in one of your newsletters), it doesn't significantly contribute to the overall
danger, but no, I don't know it exactly.
#41: You forgot to mention that small particles are not only virtually
non-removable, but you can't even find them inside a living human's body.
#42: You forgot to mention leukemia and birth defects. These are the
major health effects but others also occur.
Still, taking into account that I'm not a nuclear scientist, but a humble
software
engineer, and haven't done nearly as much of research in this field, as
you did, I would dare to conclude that my score isn't that bad at all.
Also, I have added six more questions since I realized I was letting people
off too easy. I must ask you to answer these as well, but FIRST your
answer to #40 must be much more exact:
(45) If two people each receive a dose of plutonium, but one receives 1000
times less than the other of the exact same radioisotopic composition (a
theoretical statement, of course, for just as no two snowflakes are ever
exactly alike, no two particles of mixed plutonium isotopes will be exactly
alike), what would the relative chance that the person who receives the
lower dose will suffer a health effect, compared to the chance that the
person who receives the higher dose will suffer a health effect?
I think that, when speaking about the possible health effects, we must
talk about the ABSOLUTE doses here, not the RELATIVE ones, an how
they both compare to the lethal dose.
(46) It is a given that the rate at which health effects occur in a given
population decreases as the dosage of radioactive particles which have been
inhaled or ingested is decreased. But, will there be any difference in the
TYPES of health effects either of the individuals cited in the above
question might suffer?
No.
(47) Is there such a thing as a mild form of cancer, leukemia, or birth
defect? Or are they all, at best, survivable or non-survivable horrors?
Of course, there are no "mild" forms, they all are horrors...
(48) If NASA were to announce that future space missions would use only
1/10th as much plutonium as Cassini used, do you think this would reduce
the risks to a reasonable level, if at the same time NASA tripled the
number of launches and five other countries also began launching nuclear
missions as well, because NASA's arrogance gave those other nations legal
precedent for using so-called "peaceful space exploration missions" to get
rid of some of their nuclear waste?
I don't see that NASA is going to triple the number of nuclear launches. During
the next 10 years, only 2 nuclear launches are planned - Europa Orbiter and
Pluto-Kuiper Express. The Solar Probe is currently being designed without
RTGs, as far as I know. EO and PKE can't be done without RTG's, as I
explained in my first letter. All other NASA missions will be solar. As far as
other countries go, Russia currently is in no position to launch any deep
space probes, let alone with RTGs. Mars 96 was probably was the last
breath of the Russia. More, the former USSR never had any real deep
space probes (going further than Venus and Mars), which would really
require the use of RTGs, because they were unable to build the electronics,
which could last long enough in the conditions of space to reach Jupiter or
Saturn, let alone Uranus or Neptune. I don't know about China, but it
is very unlikely that they will send a probe to Jupiter of further away
soon. The same goes for France, although now they have Ariane-5
rocket, which is really capable of sending probes to the outer planets.
All the other nuclear capable countries don't even have proven launch
vehicles for such a journey. The problem is that it takes MUCH MORE
to build and operate a deep space probe than just having a powerful
launch vehicle and Pu-238 for RTGs.
(49) Over approximately the past 4 decades, rockets from all nations
capable of launching them have failed to achieve orbit, or have failed to
escape Earth's gravitational field, or have failed at some other point, at
a fairly constant (and alarming) rate. Approximately what is that rate?
There are very reliable launch vehicles, and there are no so reliable ones.
The overall percent of successful launches world-wide, in my estimation,
is more than 80%.
(50) What's your favorite color of cancerous tumor?
I haven't seen a cancerous tumor, and hope to never see one too...
-- ---- end of quiz -----
In summary, we are no closer to being able to discuss real numbers now than
before. You continue to deny the dangers from a Cassini accident and you
describe there being "some error" in a number you have already knocked down
to 1/10th of what it should be, before taking away another 1/10th (the
proper 1/10th) for your new-and-improved RTGs.
And we haven't even started to explore what you know (or don't know) about
the physics and statistical properties of plutonium dispersal in the
environment (a good newsletter to see is #147, item #3 (A pro-Cassini
Astronomer's comments, plus my response). You need to fully understand the
uptake of plutonium by plants and animals which are then eaten by humans,
for instance. What do you know about that? (It's called
bioaccumulation.) Redistribution by the natural processes of evaporation
and rainfall? Where is that discussed in your calculations of where all
the plutonium will go in a planet with 6,000,000,000 people on it?
Furthermore, you don't seem to know that the baseline studies NASA and
everyone uses for radiation damage contain numerous points where there
could be -- indeed, undoubtedly are -- orders-of-magnitude errors which
lowered the apparent risk (this is discussed in detail in newsletter #164,
the first item).
And you have also not mentioned NASA's use of the Price-Anderson Act to
insure Cassini, which meant that even if Cassini had crashed into
poverty-stricken Africa, for example, in a late launch accident, America
would have paid out only $100,000,000 in total to cover the costs that
would have occurred. (Of course, they would have denied all cancers under
the plume were theirs, anyway.) What say you to that insurance scam? Do
you consider that to be a responsible thing do to, risking all those
cancers, and then promising not to pay for them ($100,000,000 would barely
buy the equipment for one modern emergency room, let alone pay for the
suffering deaths of millions of people)?
I thank you for your answers, but we are barely ahead of where we
were. You say you would treat "ANY" quantity plutonium "with a great
respect". I do not see that respect in anything you have said, except
perhaps where you admit that Cassini's 72.3 pounds of Pu dioxide was
"indeed quite high". Does that mean you wrote to Daniel Goldin and told
him that's how you felt?
No, I didn't write him, because I don't want the space exploration being
stopped. There is enough trouble for NASA in getting money these days,
even without such letters. In the coming days NASA may suffer from the single
largest budget cut in its history - $1.2 billion, which would almost certainly
kill all space probes planned to launch after 2001.
If so please show me the letter! If that was
"quite high" would twice that amount have been abhorrent to you? Five
times that amount? You still are putting no real numbers into this
discussion.
Thank you, however, for your attempts. Perhaps we will be able to
determine exactly what you are saying from your followup letter, which I
hope will arrive soon. In any event I do believe you are trying to have an
honest discussion about the issues, which is more than just about anyone
else from your camp has ever tried to do. I do truly appreciate it.
I still think that you would have many more people noticing and supporting
your efforts, if you would take a more cooperative, not confrontational
approach,
and won't use such phrases as "NASA is crazy", "nuclear madness", "rickety
space probe", and display your support for such actions as climbing the fences
around launch pads and sitting in the shrimp boats in a launch danger zone. This
really turns away many people, who otherwise would be much more willing to
listen to you.
Sincerely,
Russell Hoffman
I must warn you, it is unlikely that I would be able to write you a lengthy
letters,
like this one, in the coming two months, because we are finishing a big software
development project (as the owner of a software company, you should now what
it is like), and I would have virtually no free time in my office, where my PC
is
located :-(
Regards - Andrejs Jansons.
Riga, Latvia.
This appears to have become a dead end. The next letter discusses little more than how little progress was made. -- rdh
To Andrejs Jansons
Dear Sir,
My heart jumped when I saw that you were answering my questions, but when I read what you had written, I was extremely disappointed.
You have failed to answer the questions, you clearly don't know a thing about the dangers of 72.3 pounds of plutonium, and you don't even have the courage of your own convictions, that is to say, you have not written to Daniel Goldin and told him the concerns you claim you have.
Take your answer to question #45, a crucial question for indicating your understanding of the medical, statistical, and scientific principals involved. You say that you want to talk about "ABSOLUTE" doses. Fine -- go ahead and do so! You were already invited to do so, so stop claiming you are prepared to do so, and do so! That is what the question builds on -- a "VERY EXACT NUMBER" which clearly, you don't know, but you rely on. It's VERY IMPORTANT to know what the relative dangers are for lesser amounts than a "potentially lethal dose". The entire safety issue revolves around it. But you haven't resolved it, yet YOU support something that could dust the whole planet with Pu 238 in vaporized form -- over 400,000 Curies of it. Oh sure, you wrote something in answer to question #45, but it wasn't an answer! It doesn't help us to define our terms. It is not scientific. Ditto for many of the other questions.
You ask how much protection do *I* think is good enough? What I have claimed is that there was an UTTER DISREGARD for the dangers inherent in what NASA was doing and absolutely nothing you have said gives me any reason to retract that. You utterly disregard the dangers as well. You don't know the dangers, you get "theoretical" when I ask for facts, and you start questioning ME about absurd things -- like asking me what if the containment system were 10 times better or 1000 times better? It isn't. That's not reality. If the Radioactive Thermoelectric Generators (RTGs) were SMALLER -- say, the size of the Radioactive Heater Units (RHU's) (wouldn't that be nice?) what would happen in a reentry accident? Well, presuming they are built like the RHUs, they would completely vaporize! That's the reality. Containers to stop the vaporization of all of the plutonium in some reentry situations, or some of the plutonium in most of the reentry situations, DO NOT EXIST.
(See Dr. Poehler's article Cassini Cancers for a detailed discussion of this fact.) One can argue that because containment systems lower the efficiency, they actually make the problem worse! One RHU is too much plutonium spread in an environment that, according to statisticians, now has over 6 billion people on it. One RHU, with only 2.7 grams of Pu (mostly Pu 238) has roughly 10 million "potentially lethal doses" worth of Pu. One RHU is less than a thousandth the size of an RTG. That amount is obviously okay with you but it's NOT okay with me -- it's a lot of radioactive poison. And there are over 130 RHU's on board Cassini.
The tests NASA did on the containment system were clearly inadequate. What good is a test if something FAILS the test or if the test does not adequately demonstrate real situations? The results were largely unpublished, and beside that -- the things FAILED the tests anyway (they were generally tested to the point of failure). This is rather important since the debate there, is that the point the tests went to were inadequate anyway! They did NOT simulate actual possible conditions of accidents. And no independent testing was done, either -- certainly no one I would trust was allowed to run any tests. Why not? What's wrong with independent testing? At best, "trust but verify", but NASA has not earned the trust of the American people -- why should it have yours?
As to the technological hurdles you claim make Pu vital, take for example your Pu hot ice drill you said one of the missions would carry. How much Plutonium does it use? How well protected during launch and any Earth flybys is it going to be? How open and frank is NASA about the dangers? How much LESS Pu could the drill be made with in 10 years or 20 years, considering the enormous progress being made in micromachinery? (That's one reason why I'm for a 100-year moratorium on ALL nuclear launches -- so that all the associated technologies can advance so that less Pu can be used, if, indeed, any is needed at all. Another reason is so that the exact dangers can be better ascertained with proper epidemiological studies, which have yet to be done.
And a third reason is so that blinded and unthinking supporters of the technology would (hopefully) no longer be around, because future generations of scientists will (hopefully) have been properly taught about the environment, the statistics of plutonium dispersion, the medical consequences, and so forth.)
I believe your support and everything you have said is based on "principle" (and based on several fallacious assumptions), meaning I believe you would say it regardless of the actual amount of Pu NASA wishes to use. Your claims that it bothers you somewhat become hollow, precisely because you do not wish to inform Daniel Goldin of your worries and because you will not define your terms.
You say you don't see NASA tripling the number of nuclear launches? Your confidence is no guarantee. There are NO treaties which protect humans. What International Treaties there are, are criminal in their permissiveness. What's to stop America, France, China, Russia, or any other country from launching nuclear space missions, or even slow those countries down or limit the amount of Pu they can carry? Are you sure you don't just want America to do this just so that your country, Latvia, can do it later? There aren't even any Internationally-agreed-upon technical specifications for plutonium containment systems. There are no specific testing requirements for those containment systems. Nothing concrete they have to be able to withstand (including concrete) for licensing. So what sort of safeguards are there? None!
And not just for "deep space" exploration (a misnomer, anyway, as it's being used here) but for surveillance, for "lunar landers", for Mars exploration -- the list is endless, and the end is cancerous. The number of countries that will want to do it is nearly endless. Soon private enterprise. Soon anyone. Worse, Woody Smith, Curator for the Internet at NASA (last I heard), said in a letter to one of my subscribers, that rocketing waste into outer space is a good way to get rid of it -- he's crazy and so is anyone who thinks like that, sad to say -- but when does it end? Never, if people like you are unwilling to speak up and tell Dan Goldin anything the least bit negative.
Just because NASA was threatened with a budget cut (which I OPPOSED, as a silly political move timed to coincide with the Cassini debate, as you would know if you actually read some of my newsletters), you say you won't tell NASA they went at least a little too far with Cassini. Your unwillingness to speak out is EXACTLY the sort of behavior the threatened budget cut was supposed to elicit! You've been had, and you fell for it, hook, line and sinker. Your mind has been successfully controlled. Besides, the ENTIRE budget cut has been restored. So now what's your excuse for not writing Dan Goldin and telling him the concerns you say you had over Cassini? (Don't worry, I'll send him our correspondence, but you should have written to him long ago.)
Those proposed cuts you said kept you from writing were THIS year, but Cassini was launched in 1997! Cassini was started nearly a decade before that! So where were you then? Silent, no doubt. What was your excuse then (mine was that I learned about this crime in late 1996)? Do you think democracy functions when people are silent?
No democracy can function without truth and without citizen participation, and I know you said you are busy, but you should take the time to tell Daniel Goldin EXACTLY how you feel. (You should also try to figure out why you feel that way. You haven't provided me with any reason.) Writing to Goldin is (theoretically, at least) a lot more useful than talking to me, who simply can't fathom how you could possibly say the things you do. Yet it's me you write to! The least you could do in return, it tell Daniel Goldin you have done so.
Having wasted this much of my time, though, I think you should "go the final mile" and answer the last few questions properly, or admit that for you, 72.3 micrograms of plutonium, 72.3 grams, 72.3 pounds and 72.3 tons all mean more or less the same thing, and daily, weekly, monthly or yearly, and from one nation or five also all mean the same thing, and 120 deaths or 10 million (or more) are all the same thing as well, all for the sake of your precious Europa Orbiter and Pluto-Kuiper Express. Meanwhile Cassini's camera's were aimed uselessly towards the moon during the recent Earth flyby, and Al Gore's Earth observer is the first thing threatened in the phony budget cuts. How many times does the honest citizen need to be slapped in the face?
Walk through a cancer ward, and tell the patients there exactly what you want to do with your plutonium. (You must be honest about the potential health effects -- but you can't be, because you don't know!) See how much support you find there. You can't ask tomorrow's children. You can't ask those already dead from prior nuclear pollution but is that really fair? To kill someone, and then not count their opinion because they are now dead by your hand? (Yes, support for nuclear power, 63 days before Y2K, is tantamount to murder. It is my opinion that every well-educated person knows better, and hopes for a sudden sanity to take hold of the world.)
But alas, instead, in your case, you say you are now too busy to continue the conversation. I will say I don't believe you wrote your letters all alone, and I suggest you let the others who helped you, whom I suspect might even be NASA employees, try to handle it themselves, if you yourself really are now too busy. Y2K awaits, and if you (or, if I'm right that you had some help on this effort, your friends) ever want to continue the conversation, I'll be happy to continue at our mutual convenience (hopefully, before too much money has been poured into your awful missions). I thought we were going to have a thorough debate about what is going on with these nuclear launches.
Instead, you've proven yourself to be just another pro-nuclear NASA supporter, now limping away defeated and unable to carry on -- at least for a while, or, as you put it yourself, "it is unlikely I would be able to write you a lengthy letters (sic), like this one, in the coming two months, because we are finishing a big software development project...").
Well, that's no problem. I can wait, although in the meantime, good money -- millions of dollars, probably -- is being burned on these missions which should NOT be allowed! So the wait is unfair of you! But nevertheless, in honor of your schedule, I have done you the honor of taking three weeks to complete this letter! (Believe me, this letter improved tremendously since the 1st draft was written.)
Let me ask you just this simple question, though:
Had Cassini reentered Earth's atmosphere last August, how many people, all told, over the next 500,000 years (the "life" in the environment of Pu 239) do you think would have died? That is, assuming a "normal" reentry accident (not one that dips all the way into the troposphere over a rainy New York City, for instance, and not a "skipping" reentry), what do you think the effect would be? NASA said, in the next 50 years, about 120 deaths. The SER (another government report) said tens of thousands (I don't have the exact figure handy). Dr. John Gofman (his c.v. is better than yours (which you indicated is essentially nil) in this stuff (see newsletters #24 and #25)), has said 1,000,000 people. Dr. Sternglass (whose c.v. I recently saw, and it's quite a bit better than yours in this stuff too) has said ten million or more.
What is your own number, from everything you know (which I realize isn't much)?
Sincerely,
Russell Hoffman
P. S. #1: Regarding your comments about the "shrimp boat protest" and calling NASA "crazy", let me say first of all, the beauty of the "shrimp boat protest" was it was totally legal. Furthermore, it was also doomed to ultimate failure -- it could never have been more than a publicity stunt and NASA knew it all along. Why? If you remember, Cassini had about a five minute launch window every day for about two months, so clearly, it would have been virtually impossible to stop the launch that way or any other way. It was a joke used simply to prove to ourselves that NASA was paying attention to us, even though they pretended and continue to pretend they are not. In that, it worked admirably. Besides, a little civil disobedience is often a good thing. Grandmothers climbing over fences! Come on! What's wrong with a little high drama? Nothing! What's wrong with running naked through the streets of San Francisco? Nothing!
Trying to grab media attention with these sorts of things is perfectly fair, especially when you consider the way NASA abuses the truth and holds the media hostage (if you say anything bad about NASA, you often lose your press privileges or have them curtailed. That sort of thing doesn't just happen at NASA. It occurs throughout a society whose leadership (including media moguls) do not trust the citizens to be able to handle the truth.).
P. S. #2: As for calling NASA "crazy", the only reason I said that, is because I've tried to reserve "criminally insane" for the military nuclear bomb makers and their supporters.
P. S. #3: In New Scientist recently, was yet another article showing how shaky the ground is upon which you stand. Specifically I'm referring to the article titled THE LONG VIEW: NUCLEAR CENSUS WILL BRING US CLOSER TO UNDERSTANDING RADIATION'S LEGACY. It is in the October 16th, 1999 issue (page 12), and states that Susanne Bauer of the Institute for Radiation Hygiene in Oberschleissheim, Germany, "who is advising the Russians on how to evaluate the health and radiation dose data" from weapons testing points out that, in the words of the article's author (Matt Walker), "our present knowledge is mainly based on one-off, short-term doses following the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic blasts. Studies of nuclear workers give some idea of the effects of long-term, low-dose exposure, but risk estimates may be flawed for exposures that vary over time, she says."
These are serious accusations. If you don't know what you're playing with -- and there is absolutely NO possibility you do -- then you have no right to support it! If you study the opposition to nuclear power more carefully, I'm sure you will eventually realize that it is comprised at the highest levels, of highly skilled and respected medical and nuclear and other scientists, often by people who are skilled in multiple disciplines. This is not surprising because of the complexity of the issues.
It is a shame that the "demon hot atom" is supported as if it is "high technology" and worse, it is a shame that it is claimed that the nuclear option is the result of a fair choice, made by all the people in consideration of the facts. It wasn't that way at all. It was foisted on us with trickery and contempt for the truth.
It is time to examine not just the fallout from weapons testing as the New Scientist article discusses, but also the problems with Chernobyl (testing of people and monitoring of the release have both been inadequate), Tokaimura (again, every precaution they took has been inadequate, half-hearted, just for the media circus, or, in some cases, just plain stupid), and every other nuclear accident. It is time to re-examine the concept and realize we are many orders of magnitude away from sanity.
NASA needs to be told in no uncertain terms they have lied too often to the public and we want a SEA CHANGE away from their nuclear policies!
To learn about the absurd excuses NASA used to launch Cassini and its 72.3 pounds of plutonium in 1997, ask them for the 1995 Environmental Impact Statement for the Cassini mission, and all subsequent documentation. At the same time, be sure to ask them for ANY and ALL documentation available on future uses of plutonium in space, including MILITARY, CIVILIAN, or "OTHER" (just in case they make a new category somehow!). To get this information, contact:
Cassini Public Information
Daniel Goldin is the head of NASA. Here's his email address:
Here's the NASA URL to find additional addresses to submit written questions to:
http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/facts/HTML/FS-002-HQ.html
YOU HAVE A RIGHT TO KNOW WHAT NASA IS DOING TO YOUR HEALTH.
NASA should never have been allowed to launch monstrosities like Cassini and Galileo (which recently suffered a nine-hour "lost in space" anomoly (NASA calls it "safe mode" which is the opposite of what it really is) just before it did a flyby of Io), but the next breed -- such as Europa Orbiter and Pluto-Kuiper Express are not much better and the policy is being set for greatly increased rates of missions! The danger continues! To complain to NASA about their future nuclear space probes, here are two addresses you can use:
For Europa Orbiter:
For Pluto-Kuiper Express:
Be sure to "cc" the president and VP and your senators and congresspeople, too.
President Bill Clinton
Vice President Albert Gore
Secretary William Cohen
Secretary Bill Richardson
Always include your full name and postal address in all correspondence to any Government official of any country, because otherwise they will throw it out unread, or hand it directly to their police force to try to identify the author. (Thus, nothing good will come of it.) Also, ALWAYS include a personal message of some sort, indicating YOUR OWN VIEWS, even if you include a lot of material written by other people (me, for instance).
Thanks for reading! Welcome new subscribers!
Home page of our STOP CASSINI movement:
To subscribe, simply email the editor at
To unsubscribe email me and say
Published by Russell D. Hoffman electronically.
"There can be no democracy without truth, no justice without mercy, and no nuclear dispersals without ill consequences."
**************************************************************
Many of the issues presented by Russell Hoffman in this letter are based on conversations with Dr. John W. Gofman (who isolated the first working quantities of plutonium), the late Dr. Karl Z. Morgan (who was known as the "father of health physics"), Dr. Ernest Sternglass (who has done statistical studies about LLR), Dr. Jay Gould (ditto), Dr. Horst Poehler, Dr. Helen Caldicott, Dr. Ross Wilcock and dozens of activists, as well as many others on both sides of the nuclear debates, including ex military nuke expert Jack Shannon (responsible for the design of the D2G Navy reactor, the most widely used reactor in the U. S. navy), award-winning investigative reporter Karl Grossman, ecologist and human rights advocate Pamela Blockey-O'Brien, etc. Also, I've read a few dozen books on the various subjects. And scads of government documents purporting to explain how something so dangerous can be safe.
Professionally, my pump training software is used throughout the pump industry and even in some nuclear power plants around the world to train their staff about mechanical pumps. Any errors herein are regrettably my own, but I believe it would take an extremely unlikely preponderance of errors to invalidate my basic position on these issues.
*************************************************************
Hoffman's Y2K Preparedness Information:
Learn about The Effects of Nuclear War here:
************************************************************
Next issue (#219)
From: "Andrejs Jansons"
Andrejs_Jansons@swh-t.lv
To:
rhoffman@animatedsoftware.com
Message-ID:
Date: Tue, 28 Sep 1999 17:33:01 +0300
Subject: Re: Nuclear powered space missions
Founder and Editor
STOP CASSINI newsletter (soon to be renamed)
4 - 7% - 10 - 6000 microns,
the remainder - greater than 6000 microns.
----- END OF SECOND LETTER FROM ANDREJS JANSONS -----
----- MY RESPONSE TO ANDREJS JANSONS' SECOND EMAIL: -----
----- SOME MORE CASSINI QUIZ QUESTIONS: -----
------ end of quiz -----
Carlsbad, CA
----- END OF MY RESPONSE TO ANDREJS JANSONS' SECOND EMAIL -----
----- SECOND RESPONSE TO ANDREJS JANSONS' SECOND LETTER: -----
----- END OF SECOND RESPONSE TO ANDREJS JANSONS' SECOND LETTER TO RDH -----
(3) From the mailbag: A message from Latvia (part #3):
From: "Andrejs Jansons"
To: rhoffman@animatedsoftware.com
Message-ID:
Date: Mon, 4 Oct 1999 11:25:30 +0300
Subject: Re: Nuclear powered space missions
----- END OF THIRD LETTER FROM ANDREJS JANSONS -----
----- MY RESPONSE TO ANDREJS JANSONS' THIRD EMAIL: -----
----- END OF MY RESPONSE TO ANDREJS JANSONS' THIRD EMAIL -----
(4) From the mailbag: A message from Latvia (part #4):
----- FOURTH LETTER FROM ANDREJS JANSONS: -----
From: "Andrejs Jansons"
To: rhoffman@animatedsoftware.com
Message-ID:
Date: Sat, 9 Oct 1999 19:00:29 +0300
Subject: Re: Nuclear powered space missions
----- SOME MORE CASSINI QUIZ QUESTIONS: -----
Carlsbad, CA
----- END OF FOURTH LETTER FROM ANDREJS JANSONS -----
----- MY RESPONSE TO ANDREJS JANSONS' FOURTH EMAIL: -----
From: Russell Hoffman
Subject: I'm disappointed in you. (Response to your email of October 9th, 1999)
Date: Completed Oct 30th, 1999
----- END OF MY RESPONSE TO ANDREJS JANSONS' FOURTH EMAIL -----
(6) United States Government official contact points:
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
4800 Oak Grove Drive
Pasadena CA 91109
(818) 354-5011 or
(818) 354-6478
Here's NASA's "comments" email address:
comments@www.hq.nasa.gov
daniel.goldin@hq.nasa.gov
or
dgoldin@mail.hq.nasa.gov
Europa Orbiter comments"
osseuropa@hq.nasa.gov
"Pluto-Kuiper Express comments"
osspluto@hq.nasa.gov
White House, 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., N.W.,
Washington, D.C. 20500
Phone -- (202) 456-1111
Fax -- (202) 456-2461
e-mail -- president@whitehouse.gov
White House, 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.,
N.W.,Washington, D.C. 20500
Phone -- (202) 456-1414
Fax -- (202) 456-2461
e-mail -- vicepresident@whitehouse.gov
1000 Defense
The Pentagon
Washington D.C. 20301
Phone -- (703) 695-6352
Department of Energy (DoE)
1000 Independence Avenue SW
Washington D.C. 20585
Phone -- (202) 586-6210
fax -- (202) 586-4403
(7) Subscription information:
http://www.animatedsoftware.com/cassini/cassini.htm
(Accept NO imitations!)
rhoffman@animatedsoftware.com
and state:
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(8) Authorship notes and associated links:
Russell D. Hoffman, Carlsbad, California, Peace Activist, Environmentalist, High Tech Guru:
http://www.animatedsoftware.com/whoisrdh.htm
http://www.animatedsoftware.com/environm/no_nukes/y2k/index.htm
http://www.animatedsoftware.com/environm/no_nukes/tenw/nuke_war.htm
** THE ANIMATED SOFTWARE COMPANY
** Russell D. Hoffman, Owner and Chief Programmer
** Carlsbad CA
** Visit the world's most eclectic web site:
** http://www.animatedsoftware.com
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Previous issue (#217)
CASSINI TABLE OF CONTENTS
This article has been presented on the World Wide Web by:
The Animated Software Company
http://www.animatedsoftware.com
rhoffman@animatedsoftware.com
First placed online November 1st, 1999.
Last modified November 1st, 1999.
Webwiz: Russell D. Hoffman
Copyright (c) Russell D. Hoffman