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Suggested Citation:"Radiological Terrorism." National Research Council. 2002. High-Impact Terrorism: Proceedings of a Russian-American Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10301.
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Suggested Citation:"Radiological Terrorism." National Research Council. 2002. High-Impact Terrorism: Proceedings of a Russian-American Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10301.
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Suggested Citation:"Radiological Terrorism." National Research Council. 2002. High-Impact Terrorism: Proceedings of a Russian-American Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10301.
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Suggested Citation:"Radiological Terrorism." National Research Council. 2002. High-Impact Terrorism: Proceedings of a Russian-American Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10301.
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Suggested Citation:"Radiological Terrorism." National Research Council. 2002. High-Impact Terrorism: Proceedings of a Russian-American Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10301.
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Suggested Citation:"Radiological Terrorism." National Research Council. 2002. High-Impact Terrorism: Proceedings of a Russian-American Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10301.
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Suggested Citation:"Radiological Terrorism." National Research Council. 2002. High-Impact Terrorism: Proceedings of a Russian-American Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10301.
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Suggested Citation:"Radiological Terrorism." National Research Council. 2002. High-Impact Terrorism: Proceedings of a Russian-American Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10301.
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Suggested Citation:"Radiological Terrorism." National Research Council. 2002. High-Impact Terrorism: Proceedings of a Russian-American Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10301.
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Suggested Citation:"Radiological Terrorism." National Research Council. 2002. High-Impact Terrorism: Proceedings of a Russian-American Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10301.
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Suggested Citation:"Radiological Terrorism." National Research Council. 2002. High-Impact Terrorism: Proceedings of a Russian-American Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10301.
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Suggested Citation:"Radiological Terrorism." National Research Council. 2002. High-Impact Terrorism: Proceedings of a Russian-American Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10301.
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Suggested Citation:"Radiological Terrorism." National Research Council. 2002. High-Impact Terrorism: Proceedings of a Russian-American Workshop. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/10301.
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NUCLEAR TERRORISM

Radiological Terrorism Leonid Bolshov, Rafael Arutyunyan, and Oleg Pavlovsky * Russian Academy of Sciences Nuclear Safety Institute Like many countries in Western Europe, Russia has survived more than one wave of terrorism organized by people who often sincerely believed that the kill- ing of crowned heads and high-ranking bureaucrats would facilitate a change in societal relations and bring everyone the joy of freedom and prosperity worthy of mankind. That being said, the terrorism of the late nineteenth century was of a focused nature and had limited consequences. Present-day terrorism, as a rule, is represented by fairly large organizations engaged in business or political activity, but having no aversion to achieving their goals by means of terrorist acts aimed against not only individuals but also groups of common and completely innocent people. Current terrorist organizations have a fairly good understanding of a number of characteristic features of our times, among which one might point to the enormous influence of the mass media on the formation of public opinion in general, as well as the problems of "radiophobia" associated with the inadequate education of the public regarding the real consequences of nuclear accidents and incidents in particular. In current practice, the possibility that nuclear, chemical, biological, and other components will be used in applications for terrorist purposes represents a very serious problem. A whole series of reports on chemical and biological terrorism has been presented at this seminar, so we would like to touch on the theme of nuclear or, more narrowly, radiological terrorism. Terrorist acts using sources of radiation may be divided into three cate- gor~es: * Translated from the Russian by Kelly Robbins. 137

138 HIGH-IMPACT TERRORISM 1. The detonation of (or threat to detonate) either a nuclear explosive device stolen from storage arsenals or a home-made nuclear bomb device using highly enriched uranium or plutonium; 2. The theft of radioactive waste materials and similar substances from nu- clear facilities such as atomic power stations, research reactors, irradiated fuel processing plants, and storage facilities; and 3. The detonation of an ordinary explosive device including radioactive iso- topes (60Co, 90Sr, 137CS, 239PU, etc.) as one of its components, with the aim of subsequently dispersing them over significant areas. This category would also include the possible addition of radioactive substances to water supplies. Three years ago, at a seminar organized by the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), we presented a report on this same topic. Quite possibly, the lack of any sort of major progress, which we have yet to see in general since that time, is connected with the fact that such sensitive information is well protected and simply not visible to those of us in the Academy of Scienc- es. Perhaps the intelligence services have already taken all the necessary mea- sures, and the representatives of these services hear reports of this sort with a smirk, as if the academicians don't know how life really is. If that is truly the case, then we shall be very glad. If that is not the case, then it is appropriate to ask the question, What needs to be done here and how should the top priorities be correctly identified? After all, we hear and say a great deal about enriched uranium and plutonium seized in customs during attempts to sell it illegally. These materials are closely related to nuclear weapons, to that which primarily concerns us. At the same time, we know that at the international level, the treaty on the nonproliferation of nuclear weapons was unable to prevent a whole series of countries from joining the nuclear club. Not being specialists in nuclear weap- ons, we do not wish to discuss this matter further and will limit ourselves to the problem of radiological weapons. The authors of this report represent the Nuclear Safety Institute, which was created in the Russian Academy of Sciences after the Chernobyl accident so that the country would have a competent scientific organization, independent of the atomic power industry, that could conduct research on the safety of the power plants themselves as well as address issues concerning emergency and postemer- gency situations, the spread of radioactivity in the environment, and its impacts on human health. The experience of the Chernobyl accident has provided a great deal of factual material on the results of serious radiation contamination, and we would like to refer to this experience. When we speak of radiation-related terrorism, it is necessary to keep in mind the important aspect of the intensification of public perceptions of the radiation factor, which is associated for well-known reasons with how society relates to nuclear weapons and atomic power in general. In Table 1, information on the real and exaggerated consequences of the Chernobyl accident in Russia is

NUCLEAR TERRORISM 139 TABLE 1 Differences in Assessments of the Radiological Consequences of the Accident at the Chernobyl Atomic Power Plant and in the Entire Nuclear Era Author Assessment of Radiological Consequences A. Tsyb, member of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences and director of the Medical Radiological Research Center, Medical Consequences of the Chernobyl Accident, Obninsk, 2001 Ye. Masyuk, journalist. "Chernobyl: Tragedy and Business," NTV, 1999 A. Yablokov, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Human Health and the Environment as Victims of the Atomic Age. Nuclear and Radiation Safety Program Bulletin No. 5-6, 2000. (Socio-Ecological Union) "Nuclear Mythology of the Late 20th Century," New World, 1995 "Among children in Bryansk Province, there have been 55 cases of thyroid cancer caused by 13lI irradiation. Among Chernobyl emergency clean-up workers, there have been 50 cases of leukemia and 12 cases of thyroid cancer caused by the radiation factor. The radiation risks of other cancers (tumors, leukemia) are at present so small that statistically they cannot be confirmed by factual data." - . . . In the past 13 years, 100,000 people have died from radiation sickness and another 200,000 from the consequences of the Chernobyl accident." "Thus, the total number of victims of cancer, genetic damage, and birth defects in the atomic age is 2 billion 337 million people. To these figures, we must add about 500 million miscarriages (spontaneous abortions) and stillbirths, 8-14 million infant deaths, and 5 million children with problems of delayed mental development." "A number of U.S. researchers have established that in the United States from May through August 1986 there were a significant rise in the total number of deaths among the population, an increase in infant mortality, and a lowered birth rate. The high correlation of these three groups of independent data with the concentration of radioactive iodine- 131 from the Chernobyl cloud that covered the United States is so significant that there is no more than one one-thousandth chance that this link is coincidental. The number of deaths from pneumonia increased by 18.1 percent in comparison with 1985, the total mortality rate from various types of infectious diseases rose by 32.5 percent, and the death rate from AIDS increased by 60 percent." presented in cumulative form, so to speak. As for the medical data, officially confirmed by 15 years of research, we have 55 cases of thyroid cancer caused by iodine among children in Bryansk Province (see the upper part of the table). Among the people who participated in emergency recovery and cleanup efforts

140 HIGH-IMPACT TERRORISM at Chernobyl, a cohort of 116,000 individuals, there have been 50 cases of leuke- mia and 12 cases of thyroid cancer caused by radiation. All the other cancers in these cohorts cannot reliably be associated with radiation. And this is the factual side of the matter; that is, we have here dozens or hundreds of cases. Such is the order of magnitude of the medical data. At the same time, if we look at materials presented in the mass media, for example, by the Russian television network NTV (see the middle part of the table), you will see assertions that 100,000 or 200,000 people died as a result of the Chernobyl accident. The factor of 104 in fact provides a fairly good reflection of the effect of the intensified impact of media reports on the population if it is announced that it wasn't just some sort of gas pipeline that exploded, but rather radiation. The very fact that radiation is present or even might be present quickly leads to the significant intensification of public interest in the problem and often to the hyperbolized assessment of the consequences of the event. We have not even mentioned certain members of the scientific community (see, for example, the materials in the lower part of the table) who allow themselves to make pronouncements that not only are antiscientific, but also contradict simple com- mon sense, with millions and billions of victims. This, we think, is a reevalua- tion of the intensification factor that we are discussing, but nevertheless it is also a reflection of certain conceptions existing in society. Moving directly to the question of the radiological factor, we would like to speak briefly about a second situation that we mentioned earlier. We have con- sidered one of a multitude of possible versions, specifically the consequences of a terrorist action involving a research reactor. As is commonly known, any coun- tries that are presently developing atomic power or conducting research in the nuclear field are devoting very serious attention to matters concerning physical protection and the creation of barriers to the access of terrorists or other persons (so-called unsanctioned access). Therefore, we do not wish to touch on this aspect, which is not appropriate for open discussion, but rather limit ourselves to purely balanced considerations. Fuel assemblages that have been irradiated in research or power plant reac- tors could potentially be used to create different types of radiological weapons using various target delivery systems. The potential danger of radioisotopes be- ing extracted from fuel assemblages and then dispersed over a target (the most vulnerable in this sense would be cities with a highly concentrated population) could be evaluated based on the hypothetical example of the use of fuel from a 5- MW water-cooled research reactor for such purposes (Table 2~. The amount of radiologically significant isotopes (cesium, strontium, pluto- nium) produced in this research reactor might total from 10 to 60 kCi for 137CS and from 10 to 50 kCi for 90Sr. This reactor could also produce 239Pu in amounts of 50 to 150 Ci. Dispersing radioactive substances from the reactor fuel assem- blies by means of detonating a liquid or solid mixture at an altitude on the order of several hundred meters could lead to the wide-scale radioactive contamination

NUCLEAR TERRORISM TABLE 2 Some Characteristics of a 5-MOO Research Reactor 141 Type of reactor Pool Moderator Coolant Type of fuel Enrichment Mass of fissile material Maximum density of thermal neutron stream Maximum density of fast neutron stream H2O H2O Uzr-A1 20% 5~7 kg (235U) 3 x 1013 neutrons/(cm2 · second) 1 x 1014 neutrons/(cm2 · second) of a population center. Estimates indicate that the area of urban territory where measures to protect the population would be needed (shelter, temporary evacua- tion) could reach 100-200 square kilometers. This is the potential of one small research reactor. If we use the same criteria to discuss the situation with an atomic power station, the radiological potential for the discharge of the spent zone of one VVER-1000 type reactor would be two orders of magnitude higher. However, the weight of such a fuel assemblage (due to the fact that enrichment is substantially lower in commercial reactors) and the complexity of extracting active substances are so great that for the purposes of radiological terrorism it would obviously not make much sense to move from a research reactor to an atomic power plant and its irradiated fuel. Let us now move on to the main theme of this report. Estimates indicate it would be relatively easy to make "fillings" for radiological weapons from indus- trial isotope sources such as cobalt, cesium, strontium, and plutonium, which are widely used worldwide in fault detection and sterilization systems, in self-con- tained power sources, and for medical purposes, among other uses (see Tables 3 and 4~. These sources, in fact, were created by mankind for the very purpose of producing ionizing radiation. In contrast to the fuel for research reactors and atomic power plants, the fuel for these sources includes nothing extra, not 238U and not a lot of construction materials. It is a highly concentrated radiation- producing product. In view of the relatively weak controls over their use and storage, it would be significantly easier to use such sources to create radiological weapons. One could buy 100 to 1000 isotope sources operating on 60Co, 90Sr, or 137Cs in a fairly legal fashion. The potential radiological weapons that could be created from such sources would be comparable to those from the enriched nuclear fuel from the discharge of one atomic power plant. Judging from government reports published by agencies such as the Minis- try for Environmental Protection and Gosatomnadzor (the Russian Federal Nu- clear and Radiation Safety Authority), the situation in recent years has not been very favorable. For example, in 1998, more than 7000 enterprises, organizations,

42 HIGH-IMPACT TERRORISM TABLE 3 The Activity of Isotope Sources Produced Worldwide Application Radionuclide Half-Life Activity Radiation therapy Industrial radiography Sterilization Well monitoring Level gauges, thickness gauges Density detectors 6oco 137cs 192Ir 6oco 6oco 137cs 90Sr lo3pd 137cs 241Am 252cf 137cs 6oco 241Am 241Am 137cs 226Ra 252cf 5.3 years 30 years 74 days 5.3 years 5.3 years 30 years 29 years 17 days 30 years 432.2 years 2.6 years 30 years 5.3 years 432.2 years 432.2 years 30 years 1600 years 2.6 years 50-1000 TBq 500 TBq 0.1-5 TBq 0.1-5 TBq 0.1-400 PBq 0.1-400 PBq 50-1500 MBq 50-1500 MBq 1-100 GBq 1-800 GBq 50 GBq 10 GBq-lTBq 1-10 GBq 10-40 GBq 0.1-2 GBq Up to 400 MBq ~ 1500 MBq 3 GBq SOURCE: Based on materials from the International Atomic Energy Agency General Conference, September 2000. TABLE 4 Activity of Isotope Sources Produced in the Former USSR Nuclide Activity 6oco 90Sr 137cs 226Ra 239pu 0.002-320 TBq 0.5-30 TBq 0.005-120 TBq 1.1 MBq 19-190 MBq and institutions were working with atomic energy, with these locations having more than 18,000 facilities where radiation dangers were present. In 1999, only 2634 of these enterprises, having about 8000 radiation risk sites, had been li- censed by Gosatomnadzor less than half of the total. Gosatomnadzor has been actively functioning in Russia for the past 10 years. Despite the law on the use of atomic energy, which requires the licensing of any enterprise using a source of ionizing radiation, a large quantity of powerful radiation sources was also accu- mulated in medical institutions, industrial enterprises, and quarries during the long years of existence of the old system, which did not require Gosatomnadzor

NUCLEAR TERRORISM 143 licensing. As is obvious from the figures presented above, a significant portion of these sources is not under official control. If an enterprise does not want to use a radiation source at a given moment, it either keeps it in storage, throws it out, or sells it in uncontrolled fashion. If we are referring to a new source, however, there is a Gosatomnadzor requirement covering both the seller and the buyer, who must obtain a permit to use the source. Trends for radiation safety incidents at these enterprises for 1997-1999, based on data from the Russian Federation State Committee for Environmental Protection, are presented in Table 5. The unfavorable situation with regard to control over the security and use of radioisotope sources in Russia is also demonstrated by the following facts. Dur- ing 1980-1995, 80 areas of localized radioactive contamination with an open- field gamma radiation dose exceeding 1 R per hour were found on Russian territory. The nuclide content of the contamination was primarily found to be spent sources of 137CS (38 cases), 226Ra (21 cases), 60Co (10 cases), and others (11 cases). A 1999 report of the Russian State Committee for Environmental Protection notes that "sources of ionizing radiation based on 90Sr used in radioisotope ther- moelectric generators (RTGs) used as heat sources (RIT-90) present" a serious radiation hazard. At the time of manufacture, these sources contain from 30 to 180 kCi (1100-6600 TBq) of 90Sr, and the gamma radiation dose they create reaches 400-800 R per hour at a distance of 0.5 meter. According to data from the State Hydrographic Enterprise of the Russian Ministry of Transportation, along the Northern Sea corridor there are 381 RTGs in use, located in unpopulat- ed hard-to-reach areas of the Arctic tundra and used as self-contained sources of electricity for naval navigational systems. No measures have been taken for the physical protection of these units, since, when they were installed, no thought was given to the possibility of damage inflicted on them by environmental or TABLE 5 Trends for Radiation Safety Incidents Involving Ionizing Radiation Sources at Russian Enterprises (Not Including Minatom Facilities) for 1997- 1999 Type of Incident 1997 1998 1999 Source failure (repressurization) 8 3 13 Theft of source 13 22 3 Discovery of unaccounted sources 14 16 5 Breaking off of source apparatus in well shaft during 9 10 14 geophysical work Loss of source during shipment Intentional Repressurization of source 1 5 1 2 n/a NOTE: n/a = data unavailable.

144 TABLE 6 Certain Characteristics of Isotope Sources HIGH-IMPACT TERRORISM Nuclide Half-Life (years) Type of Radiation Mass of 1 Tsq (grams) 60Co 5.271 Gamma 0.024 90sr 29.12 Beta 0.20 137cs 30 Gamma 0.31 226Ra 1,600 Alpha, Gamma 27 239pu 24,065 Alpha 435 anthropogenic factors. The report emphasizes that "due to a practical lack of accounting and control over these units by the organizations operating them, certain RTGs could be lost or forgotten." The operational life spans of the major- ity of RTGs (more than 80 percent) have already run out (State Report, 2000~. These very sources of ionizing radiation are connected with the most recent incident in which several people were irradiated, which occurred near the city of Kandalaksha in May 2001. The desire to remove the lead protective covering from an unprotected navigational beacon in order to sell it at a non-ferrous metal recycling center led to the destruction of an RTG, the loss of two of its three 90Sr sources, radioactive contamination of the surrounding area, and high doses of radiation to the participants in this operation. This incident showed that there are very poor controls over such units, which are extremely dangerous from a radio- logical standpoint, and that the use of the radiation sources contained in them for terrorist purposes is highly possible. For the following analysis of possible radiological consequences of terrorist acts involving the use of radioisotope sources, we decided to select five radionu- clides, including examples of those most commonly used in the economy and those having very high potential danger to human health (Table 6~. Calculations were made with the help of the software packages "TRACE" and "NOSTRADAMUS" developed at the Russian Academy of Sciences Nucle- ar Safety Institute (Bolshov et al., 1995; Arutyunyan et al., l999b). The TRACE system is based on a fast integrated computer code utilizing a Gaussian model of atmospheric transport. In numerical, tabular, and cartograph- ic form (both in summary and for individual isotopes), it provides predictions of contamination density, open-field gamma radiation dose level, and the effective dose for internal and external radiation over the whole body and for specific organs (thyroid, gonads, lungs, red marrow, etc.) for various age groups. It typi- cally takes just a few seconds to receive results on modern personal computers using the mapping option. The NOSTRADAMUS system is intended to support decision making with regard to reducing the impact on the environment and the population in the initial urgent phase of a radiation accident. The system has been used to prepare scenarios and conduct training games and exercises both in Russia and abroad.

NUCLEAR TERRORISM 145 This software package makes it possible to analyze accidents that vary in scale from the local (lasting a few hours and affecting a few dozen square kilometers) to the relatively serious (involving several days of emissions or dispersal with an affected zone encompassing up to 1000-2000 square kilometers). The system uses the Lagrange trajectory model for the transport of elements in the atmosphere. In this feature it differs from the now widely used normative methodologies, which are based on Gaussian models. It also contains a model of the atmospheric boundary layer, which is necessary for supplying the vertical profile of the wind speed as well as for determining the category of atmospheric stability based on synoptic data. In order to determine the turbulence exchange coefficients, the system uses tabularized data based on many years of observa- tions of the vertical profile of diffusion coefficients made by the Typhoon Re- search and Production Association. Trajectory modeling capabilities make it pos- sible to calculate the transport of the contaminant over a distance of hundreds of kilometers and take into account the space-time heterogeneity of the wind field, the impact of the local land relief (orography), and the type and intensity of precipitation on the dispersion process. One of the special modules in the NOSTRADAMUS system (the "Orogra- phy" module) is intended for adaptation of the wind field to the local topography. The algorithm is based on determination of the nondivergent wind field closest to the starting point and coordinated with the topography. The dosimetric module of the NOSTRADAMUS package includes a model for calculating the dose from an end cloud and a quick algorithm for calculating the radioactive decay chain. The results of the modeling (doses and dose levels, internal and external, effec- tive and by organ, total and by nuclide, concentrations and fallout, duration of cloud presence, and levels of countermeasures) in the calculation process are depicted against the backdrop of a map of the local area (with the ability to change the levels of resolution, transparency, colors, etc.~. The presentation in- cludes either contour lines or colored areas showing the various levels. Also included are various types of output files text documents, Microsoft Excel workbooks (with a time line of the situation broken down by population center or radiological monitoring point), and others that can be independently worked on with the help of standard software products. The NOSTRADAMUS package was used to consider the radiological consequences of accidents at the Cherno- byl Atomic Power Plant and a hypothetical terrorist act involving the detonation of an explosive device with an isotope source in an urban environment. In order to evaluate the scale of the possible consequences of such a terrorist act on the territory of a large city, it was decided to use as a threshold value the magnitude of the radiation dose level received by individual members of the population. Here, as per International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) recom- mendations, the possibility that individuals might take protective measures, such as seeking shelter, was taken into account. The concentration integral data for radionuclides in the near-ground air layer corresponding to these dose limits

146 HIGH-IMPACT TERRORISM TABLE 7 Airborne Radionuclide Concentration Integrals for Situations in Which It Becomes Advisable to Alert the Population to Seek Shelter concentration integral Threshold dose Nuclide (MBq x second/m3) (mSv) Critical Factor of Effect 60Co 120 5 Gamma radiation from soil surface 90sr 75 50 Inhalation 137Cs 470 Gamma radiation from soil surface 226Ra 13 50 Inhalation 239pu 0.26 50 Inhalation are presented in Table 7. As evident from the data in this table, for 60Co and 137CS the critical factor was the dose of radiation received by people from local radionuclide fallout during the first 10 days. Meanwhile, normalization for doses from internal radiation due to inhalation had a greater impact for 90Sr, 226Ra, and 239Pu. These calculations were made using the imitation Monte Carlo method for an urban area. Preliminary calculations indicated that depending on the orienta- tion of buildings relative to the trajectory of the movement of the emission cloud and on the formation of stagnant zones and tunnel effects, the radionuclide con- centration integral in the near-ground air layer in the urban environment can differ from its open-field value by one order of magnitude in either direction. For each possible variation in weather conditions, effective altitude of the emission cloud, and initial activity level of the radioisotope source, we calculated concen- tration integrals for 10,000 arbitrarily selected points in a 10- by 5-km rectangle. The emission source was located in a lower corner of this rectangle. Next, we evaluated the amount of radioactive material in the detonated device, after the explosion of which the radionuclide concentration integral values given in Table 7 would be exceeded at a distance of more than 100 meters or over an urban area of more than 1 square kilometer. The results of such calculations for a situation TABLE 8 Amount of Dispersed Radionuclides (in Grams) Requiring the Population to Take Shelter at Distances of No Less Than 0.1 km from the Emission Source Weather category 6oco 90sr 137Cs 226Ra 239pu A 0.020 0.11 1.0 2.6 0.82 D 0.052 0.28 2.8 6.9 2.2 F 0.021 0.11 1.0 2.8 0.88

NUCLEAR TERRORISM 147 TABLE 9 Amount of Dispersed Radionuclides (in Grams) Requiring the Population to Take Shelter over an Area of at Least 1 Square Kilometer Weather Category 6oco 90Sr 137Cs 226Ra 239pu A 2.5 14 140 340 110 D 1.1 6.1 60 150 47 F 0.10 0.55 5.5 14 4.3 involving the detonation of a charge equal in power to 50 kg of TNT are present- ed in Tables 8 and 9. From the material in these tables, it follows that the mass of radionuclides to be added to an explosive device could be very small. Therefore, there are no technical problems in producing such types of radiological weapons, at least those using beta- and alpha-emitters as radioisotopic filling. Unfortunately, it should also be noted that the illegal weapons market in Russia is currently very widespread, so that obtaining the necessary amount of explosive material or a ready-to-use explosive device is not an insurmountable obstacle. The events in Chechnya and adjoining regions also shows that Chechen terrorists have begun making a widespread practice of using condemned prisoners to carry out terrorist acts. One cannot rule out the possibility that in order to raise the morale of their fighters they may also find individuals wishing to explode a "radiological bomb" in the name of the struggle against the "infidel" and for the glory of Allah. Let us recall that after a container of 137CS was found in Moscow's Izmailovsky Park in November 1995, there followed a declaration by Dzhokhar Dudayev, who said that "what we have demonstrated in Izmailovsky Park to the entire world com- munity and to Moscow is just a meager portion of the radioactive substances that we possess." It is entirely possible that this was simple bravado; however, we must not forget that one of the largest radioactive waste storage facilities in the region is located in the territory of Chechnya. No one can undertake to guarantee that nothing has disappeared from this facility in all the years of military actions. This is an important result, from which very serious conclusions should be drawn from the standpoint of the need to observe the strictest controls both over the use and security of radioisotopes and over the creation of effective technical means for monitoring the transport of isotope-containing products within the country and across its borders. The increasingly frequent reports in the mass media and from official agencies regarding thefts of and subsequent attempts to sell radioactive substances speak to the fact that the criminal world is taking an ever more active interest in such types of products. It is entirely possible that we shall soon witness a case in which nuclear and radioactive materials are used as a means of terror or a tool of blackmail. A serious intensification of controls is also needed regarding the black market in conventional arms and explosive devices. In conclusion, it should be emphasized once again that despite the serious-

148 HIGH-IMPACT TERRORISM ness of the possible unfavorable radiological consequences of such a terrorist act for the population, its sociopsychological and economic consequences for a giv- en city, a region, or even an entire country could turn out to be simply cata- strophic. REFERENCES Arutyunyan, R., I. Linge, O. Pavlovski, et al. 1999a. Experience of preparation of exercises and practical games on emergency preparedness and response in case of radiation accidents. Pro- ceedings of the Seventh Topical Meeting on Emergency Preparedness and Response. Santa Fe, N.M., September 14-17, 1999, p. 62-A. Arutyunyan, R., V. Belikov, V. Goloviznin, V. Kiselev, et al. l999b. Models for the distribution of radioactive contamination in the environment. News of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Energy, first edition, pp. 61-76. Bolshov L., R. Arutunyan, M. Kanevskiy, V. Kiselev et al. 1995. Development of specialized soft- ware for the analysis of consequences of large-scale radiological accidents. Proceedings of Ninth Annual Symposium on Geographic Information Systems in Natural Resources Manage- ment, Vancouver, Canada, Vol. 1, pp. 314-318. State Committee of the Russian Federation on Environmental Protection. 2000. State Report on the Natural Environment in the Russian Federation in 1999. Moscow: State Center for Ecological Programs, 580 pp.

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In June 2001 the National Academies and the Russian Academy of Sciences held a bilateral workshop in Moscow on terrorism in a high--technology society and modern methods to prevent and respond to it. The purpose of the workshop was to begin a dialogue on high--impact terrorism that could lead to further U.S.--Russian collaboration. This volume includes papers presented at the workshop by 31 Russian and American experts on various types of high-impact terrorism, including biological and agricultural terrorism, nuclear and electromagnetic terrorism, explosives, chemical, and technological terrorism, and cyber terrorism. The papers also address legal issues, Russian internal affairs, and the future of international cooperation in this area.

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