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			THE CBRN THREAT: Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear Event Potentiality & Preparedness

Part I: Chemical Threat Landscape

As every school-age child is taught, chemicals are a part of everyday life; nearly everything we touch today has undergone some type of chemical treatment. Public health is maintained through chemical treatment throughout the water cycle, to mitigate biological contaminants of the water supply, largely through the use of chlorine. As such, great quantities of chlorine are stored near to most of the major metropolitan areas in the United States.

In the northeast, much of the chlorine supply passes through facilities near New York City, in Kearny, NJ, where prevailing wind patterns would make a spill or intentional release a devastating event, putting the welfare of nearly 17 million people at risk:

Chlorine is only one toxic substance manufactured and/ or stored near New York City; the following map shows release data for the area, with high level releasesin red and moderate level releases in blue:

New York City Metro Area Toxic Release Map generated at Mapecos.org

Industrial spills have, in the past, caused great damage and loss of life. Accidents like that of Union Carbide's in Bhopal India and the Exxon Valdez accident, showed the world the need for better monitoring of manufacturing, processing and shipment of chemicals. Devestating events of smaller scale receive less coverage, despite tragic consequence. On March 18, 2009, a small amount of Ammonia was spilled in the Maersk headquarters in Copenhagen Denmark, making it's way into the HVAC system, causing the complete shutdown and evacuation of the building, and necessitating treatment for some 1200 employees (Story here). So, with accidental releases demonstrating the potential devastation that could occur if intent was applied, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security established the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS) in June 2007, a set of regulations pertaining to the management of toxic chemicals at manufacturing facilities. However, little has been done to establish a standard procedure for monitoring releases and protecting private and govenrment property from contamination in the event of accidental or intentional chemical release.

Part II:Radiological/Nuclear Threat Landscape

Radiactive materials, like toxic industrial chemicals, are, ubiquitous; the use of radiation in industrial, military, and medical applications means that there exists a surfeit of materials of varing degrees of toxicity in and around major population areas. Whether improper handling is through error or intent, the consequences range from singularly debilitating to overwhelmingly disasterous: no good can come of improperly safeguards surrounding radioactive materials, either at the place of deployment or in the surrounding community.

Nuclear Power/ Reactor based threat

Movies and popular culture focus on reactor meltdown as a threat to life in proximity to power plants. Nuclear facilities are often mentioned when discussion of "America's aging power grid" is the subject for discussion. Despite the sensationalism, nuclear power is not without risk, especially since media-driven public pressure has been contributory to the decrease in new plants, with older facilities staying in operation to meet ever-increasing power demands.

Reactor based radiation accidents have differed by an order of magnitude, from low-level worker exposure to Chernobyl, the latter of which. In the U.S., Three Mile Island is the worst reported event to date, where a reactor leak inreleased radioactive iodine into the atmosphere, which was picked up in the wind and detected as far as 20 miles away. Studies as to the effect of the event on local residents differ in their conclusions. The event was a watershed: no new reactors have been authorized for construction in the period since, making those that are in operation today (as I write this on March 28th 2009, the thirtieth anniversary of TMI over thirty years old.

On the adjacent map of east coast nuclear facilities , the blue circles demonstrate the risk to American cities: the outer circle represent the 200-mi radius, defined by the incidence of increased thyroid cancer around Chernobyl; the inner blue circle represents the 20 mile radius of radioactive iodine fallout following Three Mile Island. As you can see, nuclear power is never that far away; all major metropolitan areas are within a short drive to a reactor.

So as you can see, much of the US.population has the potential to be affected by accidental or intentional radioactive release through reactor failure. A coordinated attack against several facilities would have devastating impact on municipal, commercial and medical infrastructure.

Medical and Industrial Isotopes

For all of the attention paid to nuclear power, industrial and medical radiological materials that pose the greatest threat to public health.Their wide proliferation and variety of uses puts people of very diverse degrees of understanding of the adverse health effects of mishandling into contact with the substances. Over the past thirty years, nearly all of the reported radiological deaths occured as a result of accident or mishap, rather than malintent. However, the capture through theft of sizable amounts of an isotope makes development and attack via improvised radiological device ("dirty bomb") a threat that cannot be ignored.

IWhile conspiracy to explode a dirty bomb in London was exposed in 2005 (see video to left), examination of the "casual" events of the last thirty years gives an insight into the consequence of accidental misuse: for every life lost in the events listed below, the potential for incidental exposure to others and area contamination disrupted whole communities. The 1987 Goiania, Brazil event involving cesium 137 had far greater implication than the four deaths.

RADIOLOGICAL INCIDENT FATALITIES 1981-2000

Year	Location	Application	Worker/Public Fatalities
1981	Oklahoma, USA	Industrial radiography	1/0
1982	Kjeller, Norway	Irradiation facility	1/0
1984	Morocco	Lost iridium-192 source	0/8
1987	Goiania, Brazil	cesium-137 teletherapy	0/4
1989	San Salvador	Irradiation facility	1/0
1990	Israel	Irradiation facility	1/0
1990	Zaragoza, Spain	Linear accelerator	0/11
1991	Nesvizh, Belarus	Irradiation facility	1/0
1992	Xinzhou, China	Lost cobalt-60 source	0/3
1992	Indiana, USA	Iridium-192 brachytherapy	0/1
1994	Tammiku, Estonia	scrap cesium-137	0/1
1996	Costa Rica	Cobalt-60 teletherapy	0/7
2000	Thailand	Lost cobalt-60	0/3
2000	Egypt	Lost iridium-192	0/2
2000	Panama	Cobalt-60 teletherapy	0/5

1987: Goiania, Brazil    Hospital Therapy Device Stolen                                            

Summary: some two years after a radiotherepy clinic was abandoned in 1985, a radiotherapy device containing Cesium 137 was scavenged from the facility. Fascinated by the errie blue color, the scavengers showed the substance off to friends, family and neighbors before selling the lot for scrap metal. The scavengers and others shown the device and it's radioactive content began to feel ill effects, and the material was taken to a nearby hospital, triggering a massive investigation that affected over 100k people.

AFFECTED:

• 1375 Ci of Cesium 137 broken up and dispersed
• 112,800 monitored
• 249 Contaminated
• 120 shoes and clothes
• 149 External and internal contaminated
• 20 Req specific hospital treatment
• 14 BM suppression
• 8 treated with GM-CSG
• 4 Deaths due to hemorrhage or infection
  

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goi%C3%A2nia_accident

 

 

Overview

The past twenty years have seen numerous attacks against major civilian populations by terrorists . New York, Madrid, London, Paris, Tokyo, Mumbai—all have been victims of attack by various means. Students of politics will debate the causal events and motivations, but it is a widely held belief that attacks will continue, and the belief amongst security experts is that intentional airborne contamination by chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear (CBRN) means represents the leading terrorist potentiality faced by society today.

The simple fact is this: the availability of harmful materials—toxic inducstrial chemicals (TICs), medical and industrial radiological isotopes, surplus and contraband nuclear material and pharmaceutical and educational strains of biological toxins—in low security environments in close proximity to major population centers make these substances targets for theft; the ease witrh which the same substances can be "weaponized" for airborne disbursal makes them high-likelihood candidates for use in terrorist attack.

That said, the threat represented by these materials should not be underestimated; over the years, accidental death, debilitationthrough the mishandling and accidental release of these substances has been considerable. So while terroristic exploitation of harmful materials is a cause for concern, the fact remains that bad things do sometimes happen by accident, and continuity planning against all types of threat vectors by these toxins is prudent. In light of this, various federal agencies have in recent years released guidelines for the private sector with regards to the protection of people, places and infrastructure from the threat represented by these substances.

For Matters of this discussion, the topic has been segmented as follows:

• Chemical Threat Landscape
• Radological/Nuclear Threat Landscape
• Federal Guidelines for CBRN protection

With links to the corresponding sections located on the menu to the left.