How I learned to stop worrying, and love the bomb

This past week I finished Cormac McCarthy's The Road. A terrifying yet beautiful novel about a father and son trying to make their way in the post apocalyptic United States. It was horrible - blood thirsty gangs roaming the streets for their next cannibal meal, any and everything has been charred or turned to ashes. City blocks are now turned to rubble, the only way to survive is scavenging bits and pieces of food. In other words, what it is like to live in detroit.
This started a narrative in my mind of what it would actually take to survive nuclear war, god forbid that it ever take place. How much food would you have to store? How do you build/buy the correct shelter? When do you get to leave the shelter? The day after I finished the book, there was a program on underground shelters airing on the history channel. I can't find any information


about it on the web, but in Washington state the show featured this seemingly normal suburban home that had a four story deep nuclear fallout shelter beneath it. The patriarch of the family dug this by hand over a period of 10 years. It is around 2000 square feet and has four different access points, one which they would not reveal.  It had all the bells and whistles including a one ton blast door. Also, since the location of this shelter was hardly a secret the man had put in numerous countermeasures to repel any people that wanted to get into his shelter in a time of need.


So, what does it take to build and survive in your shelter? First you have to know a few things about nuclear explosions and the effect of fallout.
This chart clearly illustrates the effect of a 500kt bomb. Unless you are semi-sheltered at around 7.3  miles you will either be picked off you feet by the force of the blast and thrown into something, which will probably kill you. If not that flying debris will. Also, if you happen to be within line of sight of the explosion it is possible that you can receive second degree burns from as far as 10 miles away ans in addition to this it is still possible to be hurt or killed by flying debris. Ouch.

 The chart on the left shows the dangers from the pressure that a nuclear weapon poses. As you may or may not know, when a  large bomb explodes, most of the time a person is not killed by the schrapnel or fireball, but from the momentary increase in the air pressure surrounding the victim. This results in a "crushing" effect of sorts that can literally crush your body to bursting your lungs to bursting your eardrums. Really, really unpleasant stuff. However, the bright side is that the further away you are the effects of pressure change decline exponentially.

This brings us to shelter construction and an attempt to define what is and is not a suitable shelter. It seems reasonable that taking shelter in a basement would be suitable, given that you are around ten miles away from the blast. However, you cannot account for whether or not there will be a large fire which will then entomb you in your basement from a lack of oxygen, also basements are only good to 5 psi,hence the need for a durable and hardened structure away from the home, such as the backyard.


The structure on the left hand side was a semi-hardened above ground bunker built in Nagasaki, Japan. Sure, this would have probably worked for a conventional air raid, but it was pretty much useless here. I'm assuming the occupants were killed by overpressure. Supposedly ,it reached around 53 psi in this area. Had they have even known what was about to transpire or even had the resources they would have reinforced the door. This is where bunker construction seems tricky. Where do you get doors that are rated for 50 psi? Sure, some of these survivalist outfits sell them, but do you really need an iron door that can be filled with concrete, for the bargain price of $2,500? From what I have gathered, you need something that can open and lock from the inside. I could totally be wrong, but it seems that underground, hardened shelters need less protection in the way of doors. I guess that another way around this would be to have two heavy doors with a serpentine passageway consisting of two or more 90 degree turns. This would decrease the amount of pressure by making it have to work harder to get around the turns, much like bending a water hose.



This is only the beginning of what are seemingly a series of contradictions regarding the construction of fallout shelters. One place is saying that you need a blast relief valve ($460.00) or you are a dead man. Another guy says that all you need to clean incoming air is a wet sheet, and then someone else will contradict that by saying you absolutely need to have a HEPA NBC filter to decontaminate all incoming air. WTF? Then there is the whole "concrete is bad" school of thought. Don't get me started.  I'm really, really starting to get confused by what originally seemed as simple as digging a hole in the ground. Oh, did I mention that you need another hole to stick an antenna out of to recieve broadcasts?





Don't despair though, according to the govt. nuclear war won't be as bad as we think it will be. Firestorms can only travel so far right? You saw the videos too, even the nice lady was able to eat the canned foods at the end of the test, and the mannicans only got a little sunburn. Also, remember the shelter in Nagasaki? It was 100 yards from ground zero. The most encouraging thing however is the amount that radiation decreases after the initial explosion. After 48 hours it's safe enough to take a good look-see, but evidence suggest that you should haul ass back to the shelter rather quickly. The exposure to radiation lessens after a while, but you need to be careful about how long you are spending out of the shelter. Also, for every 3.6 inches of concrete you are reducing your radiation risk by 1/4. Based on the evidence that I gathered here on the internet, I present to you the Official Cobalt_Blue Nuclear Holocaust Survival Guide.


1. Build bomb shelter - two entry/exit points (you don't want to be buried in your shelter do you?) Personally I prefer a concrete box two feet thick on each side with reinforced rebar buried to a depth of eight feet. Don't forget to install a reinforced vent, and one of those fucking blast proof valves ($460.00) I think that a comfortable space for two people for three weeks would be around 400 square feet.

2. Stock shelter with enough freeze dried  and canned food, water, US magazine, guns, ammo, gas masks, a radio and recreational drugs to hold you out for at least a month. Don't forget to get a composting toilet too.

3. Can opener.

4. Wait for a month, awake from bender then go to the surface and see if everything is ok.

5. Loot what is left at Neiman Marcus, then bribe National Guard and Red Cross volunteers with the baubles that you have recently acquired. Don't forget the canned peaches either, everyone loves canned peaches.

6. Stand on high point overlooking ruined city at sunset swaddled in surplus blankets.

Disclaimer - Cannot be held responsible for any loss of life come doomsday
Disclaimer #2 - I left out a BUNCH of stuff, like EMP, so don't bust my balls, ok?

P.S. Fuck vox fomatting