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RE: One day story - compare Bhopal, Seveso.....
All,
Interestingly, there was a story on NPR on the 20th anniversary of Bhopal: //www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4199681. According to my memory of the broadcast, they interviewed one woman whose husband died, and she received about US$4,000 and an apt without utility service as compensation. It appears that some was compensation offered. I think I recall that at the time of the disaster or soon afterward, the Indian authorities issued an arrest warrant for the chairman of Union Carbide.
I also agree with much of what Bob Cherry said about conspiracies. One aspect of conspiracy theories is that they morph to fit all circumstances so that evidence to the contrary becomes proof of conspiracy; that is, in the minds of conspiracy theorists, the conspirators let out just enough information to *disprove* a given conspiracy just to throw off the masses.
Finally, I think that the boards of publicly held companies have a fiduciary duty to stockholders to run the company in manner to serve the interests of the stockholders not the public, the "truth," or anyone else. I'm not a legal expert, so I don't know what laws apply. It's in the interest of publicly held companies to maximize profits. Privately held companies and advocacy groups, of course, do not have that obligation.
The statements and opinions expressed herein are my responsibility; no one else (certainly not my employer) is responsible, but I still reserve the right to make mistakes.
Check core temperature: yes./no? Yes! - Homer Simpson
Gerald A. Falo, Ph.D., CHP
Kadix Systems
U.S. Army Center for Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine
jerry.falo@us.army.mil
410-436-4852
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu [mailto:owner-radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu] On Behalf Of Franz Schönhofer
Sent: Sunday, December 05, 2004 4:14 PM
To: 'Stabin, Michael'; radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu
Subject: AW: One day story - compare Bhopal, Seveso.....
Mike,
I agree with a lot of what has been written in reply to your posting.
But let us go a step further:
First question: Does anybody on RADSAFE know the name "Bhopal"? On Friday, Dec. 3rd was the twentieth anniversary of an unbelievable catastrophe, when in a chemical factory of Union Carbide in Bhopal, India, chemicals were spread by an explosion over the vicinity of the factory, causing within the same night 8,000 deaths and altogether until now about 20 000 deaths. The average time of the firstly affected persons to die was 3 minutes. More than 100 000 people are still affected by the poisoning. Union Carbide was bought by Dow Chemical in 2001. Neither of those companies paid any compensations to victims or their relatives. The place of the factory has not been cleaned up yet after 20 years.
Second question: Does anybody know the name "Seveso"? This should be an easier question, because it is not as far away as India and does not involve those "underdogs" of India, but it is in Italy!
I know of the stories (I recently read one again about millions affected by Chernobyl), but I know no answer for the question, why nuclear is so much in focus of the mass media and the average population, though we have so much more severe catastrophes - not only in nature, but also in chemical industry.
Best regards,
Franz
Franz Schoenhofer
PhD, MR iR
Habicherg. 31/7
A-1160 Vienna
AUSTRIA
phone -43-0699-1168-1319
> -----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
> Von: owner-radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu [mailto:owner-
> radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu] Im Auftrag von Stabin, Michael
> Gesendet: Sonntag, 05. Dezember 2004 04:44
> An: radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu
> Betreff: One day story
>
>
> Saturday, December 04, 2004, Associated Press - HOUSTON - An explosion
> at a chemical plant Friday that could be heard 20 miles away caused a
> large fire and sent up massive clouds of smoke...
> http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,140490,00.html
>
>
> I ask you, in all seriousness, viewing the spectacular images of this
> scene, would this have been a one day story if it had instead involved
> any kind of nuclear facility? Tomorrow this will be forgotten, but
will
> be followed by a number of similar stories throughout 2005: tanker
> trucks, rail cars, facilities full of toxic chemicals will be involved
> in accidents. Entire communities will be evacuated, emergency
responders
> will be adversely affected, there may be loss of life. Will any
efforts
> comparable to those employed in nuclear-related industries to reduce
and
> optimize radiation dose be made to increase the safety of these
> industries? No.
>
> This is why, in my comments on the ICRP 2005 initiatives, I called an
> "ethical consideration" the extreme lengths that we go to in
protecting
> humans, and now elements of the environment (as I call it, the "Dose
to
> Bunnies and Bushes Initiative") from doses of radiation comparable to
> natural background levels. As much as we would all like more funding
for
> health physics studies, we have been chasing picoSv of dose to humans
> for too long, and now are going to chase picoSv of dose to bunnies and
> bushes, while society's resources could be spent instead on reducing
> REAL morbidity and mortality elsewhere? This is simply wrong, and I
will
> not keep silent about it.
>
>
> Mike
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