North Korea Nuclear Tests Raise Fears of Radioactive Fallout
- 7 years ago
North Korea Nuclear Tests Raise Fears of Radioactive Fallout
30, 2017
SEOUL, South Korea — Another powerful blast at North Korea’s underground nuclear test site could destabilize the area and send radioactive material into the atmosphere, the head of South Korea’s weather agency said on Monday "Should another nuclear takes place, there is
that possibility," Nam Jae-cheol, director of the Korea Meteorological Administration, told lawmakers inquiring about the potential for radioactive fallout.
Edwin Lyman said that While radioactive material would be released into the environment if the collapse occurred right after a test, the amount of fallout, even
from a weapon in the 100 kiloton range, would likely only cause significant contamination in the vicinity of the site and perhaps a few hundred miles downwind,
" he said. that Nevertheless, any amount of radioactive contamination of the environment from
North Korea’s abhorrent nuclear test program is unacceptable and would add insult to injury,
A day after the Sept. 3 test, the newspaper quoted a senior Chinese nuclear scientist who warned
that a future test could blow the top off Mount Mantop, causing radioactive contamination of the atmosphere.
North Korea has conducted six nuclear tests since 2006, all of them in tunnels
buried deep under Mount Mantap in Punggye-ri, in North Hamgyong Province.
There was no reason to believe that North Korea would abandon Punggye-ri as a nuclear testing site, they said.
On Friday, The South China Morning Post reported that researchers at the Institute of Geology
and Geophysics, an arm of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, had warned their North Korean counterparts of an implosion at the test site, 50 miles from the border with China.
30, 2017
SEOUL, South Korea — Another powerful blast at North Korea’s underground nuclear test site could destabilize the area and send radioactive material into the atmosphere, the head of South Korea’s weather agency said on Monday "Should another nuclear takes place, there is
that possibility," Nam Jae-cheol, director of the Korea Meteorological Administration, told lawmakers inquiring about the potential for radioactive fallout.
Edwin Lyman said that While radioactive material would be released into the environment if the collapse occurred right after a test, the amount of fallout, even
from a weapon in the 100 kiloton range, would likely only cause significant contamination in the vicinity of the site and perhaps a few hundred miles downwind,
" he said. that Nevertheless, any amount of radioactive contamination of the environment from
North Korea’s abhorrent nuclear test program is unacceptable and would add insult to injury,
A day after the Sept. 3 test, the newspaper quoted a senior Chinese nuclear scientist who warned
that a future test could blow the top off Mount Mantop, causing radioactive contamination of the atmosphere.
North Korea has conducted six nuclear tests since 2006, all of them in tunnels
buried deep under Mount Mantap in Punggye-ri, in North Hamgyong Province.
There was no reason to believe that North Korea would abandon Punggye-ri as a nuclear testing site, they said.
On Friday, The South China Morning Post reported that researchers at the Institute of Geology
and Geophysics, an arm of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, had warned their North Korean counterparts of an implosion at the test site, 50 miles from the border with China.