> In the book (by Neville Shute, author of "A Town Like Alice"and "The Far

["Shane Polle" <shanep@amc.aust.com>]

> In the book (by Neville Shute, author of "A Town Like Alice" and "The Far
> Country", they live on an electrified line. Electricity comes from coal.
> Whilst the book (written early 1960's) says we produce no oil, that has
> changed. We now produce a large proportion of our oil needs. 
> > The story (in the book) was that cobalt bombs were used - lethal radiation
> for 5 years. Does anyone actually have any of these?
> With normal nukes, you can come out of your fallout shelter after 2 weeks.
> 
>> 
>> The premise was that Australia doesn't produce any oil, but had lots of
>> coal. That's why there was a steam loco on the country train.
>> >> Cheers
>> David
> > Well, I'm glad I didn't watch long enough to actually pick up theplot...perhaps the books is better!

I studied physics, never heard of a "cobalt bomb", a normal H, U or even a 'banned' neutron bombs do not leave high levels a radiation in the atmosphere for more than a few weeks. 

While an atomic bomb will leave radioactive particles for thousands of years, all radioative atoms are very heavy and will fall to earth 
quickly, making the air safe to breath within a number of weeks of the blast at ground zero.

 However, top soil may be contaiminated and must be scraped back before sowing. However usually in some areas this may happen
naturally due to wind and rain erroding the now devegiated soil.

Radon of course is a gas, but once again, it will settle in low lining areas. The total amount of air born radioactive particles required to 
make the whole planet toxic would be huge, more than what we have in stockpile world wide. When they talk on TV etc global 
enilation, they mean that if every bomb was let off, we could destroy every piece of land possible, but 2-3 weeks later we could come 
out of our bunkers and breath the now safe air and realise that we have as a human race, F$%#ed up big time.

Shane