What's wrong with a Simpson's-esque fish? I always wanted one...

on a serious note, that friggin just messed up. I hope it really WAS just trace amounts. and who would have known if it hadn't leaked on one of our allies?

No biggie, The Japanese don't eat much fish anyway. Neither do the Guamanians or the Hawaiians.
. It was just bait. you know, for cat food.

Like mercury in vaccines they will just claim "its just a trace" or any mishap that occurs they will blame on Hiroshima residues and "natural background levels".

Of course it could just be like the beryllium issue
http://science.house.gov/press/PRArticle.aspx?NewsID=2154

Hammertime @ 1:

Funding Iraq War Debacle == Deferred Maintenance on Boomer Subs?

hey, no fair. they were underwater and GW never knew about them!

just in time for the hiroshima, nagasaki anniversary.. nice

Don't you think you're hyping this a tad bit ? I doubt it was a large leak as it would have compromised the subs ability to be "undetectable" .

Jumping on the "3 eyed" fish wagon feels more like anti nuclear ranting then proper news reporting which can only be detrimental to this site on the long run.

once again, my fellow countrymen know absolutely jack about nuclear power as evident by these comments

if you live near a coal power plant, or use a cell phone. guess what, you just got exposed to more than that leak caused.

the only country where this is an issue is the US, where we have such poor science education that people have no freaking clue what happens in a reactor or what is actually dangerous about it. they just think of 3 eyed fish and green glowing stuff (both of which don't exist).

we pumped a hell of a lot more into the drinking water in iraq than what was released here. just look up depleted uranium (warning, these are the most gruesome pictures you might ever see).

read up, or shut up. and for those who are just freaked by words like radiation and nuclear. MRI is really called NMRI for Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Imaging (OMG your doctor is trying to mutate you!!!!)

From a former US Navy nuclear submariner: this kind of thing is not that uncommon. In fact, the Naval Nuclear community is extremely paranoid about stuff like this. If experience (and a bit of cynicism) serves me right, what probably happened here is that there was a valve improperly aligned because the way navy nukes do it is ridiculous and the procedure leaves itself wide open for accidental mistakes (ironically, the procedure is specifically designed to prevent exactly this). But these tiny mistakes are made a big deal out of. The reason it took a couple of weeks is because the chain of command likes to critique the incident, make an incident report, and get their ducks in a row before going public. I've seen people lose rank and get fired over a lot less.

The design of the plant is incredibly reliable, in fact, "radioactive" water that is discharged from the nuclear plant is heavily filtered through several classified mechanisms, and any activity that exits with the water is likely less of that of a banana.

Chances are not a piece of plankton was mutated or a fish harmed. Unfortunately, it's completely understandable that the word "nuclear radiation" rings a million bells for these paranoid folks.

kush @ 15:

Water is one of the few things to contain radioactivity. Nuclear power has great potential and needs a lab to refine that energy source for the future. The USN is transparent. The civilian sector would cover up this incident. Get easy, the Russian Navy is 1000x worse.

COME ON! Water contains radioactivity... IF THE WATER IS CONTAINED. Water in the ocean is its own universe. If radioactivity is released in that water... IT'S IN THE UNIVERSE.

CowBoy Bob in Austin @ 18:

kush @ 15:

Water is one of the few things to contain radioactivity. Nuclear power has great potential and needs a lab to refine that energy source for the future. The USN is transparent. The civilian sector would cover up this incident. Get easy, the Russian Navy is 1000x worse.

COME ON! Water contains radioactivity... IF THE WATER IS CONTAINED. Water in the ocean is its own universe. If radioactivity is released in that water... IT'S IN THE UNIVERSE.

srsly, your dumbness is such a simple captcha would block you from commenting, for ever.

I have just ONE WORD for all you NEO CON CRAZIES out there who are going to want to minimize and mitigate this... and the prospects of increased use of NUCLEAR for power generation:

CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER,
CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER,
CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER,
CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER,
CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER,
CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER,
CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER.

Do I have to repeat myself?

It would be interesting to know how Bqs were released before speculating on environmental damage. I'm very curious about D@16 's comment about valve alignment. What is peculiar about Navy protocol in this regard?

A Frenchman @ 12:

Don't you think you're hyping this a tad bit ? I doubt it was a large leak as it would have compromised the subs ability to be "undetectable" .

Jumping on the "3 eyed" fish wagon feels more like anti nuclear ranting then proper news reporting which can only be detrimental to this site on the long run.

Just to inject a tiny note of reality here: Nuclear subs from a bunch of countries have been patroling the waters of this planet for decades.

Some of them are so old that they are pretty much derelicts. We tend to decommission our ships - usually, but other countries sell them to poorer countries. Do you think for one moment those countries are practicing any kind of safety proticol wen it comes to things like this leak?

We just love to get outraged when something like this pops up, but the rest of the time we want to ignore the entire rest of the world.

Guess what, there are a crap load of nukes in the water right now, from more countires than most Americans would guess. Some of them are pretty damn old and some of them weren't built to good in the first place.

We take more precautions building and running ours than any other country - hands down.

A Frenchman @ 12:

Don't you think you're hyping this a tad bit ? I doubt it was a large leak as it would have compromised the subs ability to be "undetectable" .

Jumping on the "3 eyed" fish wagon feels more like anti nuclear ranting then proper news reporting which can only be detrimental to this site on the long run.

I was going to say the same. It was so far below the threshold that they couldn't detect it until now, and in fact, it's very likely the leak could have started at any point between Japan and Hawaii.

I wonder if the montauk monster is a byproduct of the building of nuclear subs in conn.

here

zugzug @ 31:

for those people here who might not know any better, there are lots of types of "radiation" that could be leaked that would become entirely harmless once diluted into the ocean.

It depends a lot on what happened, and they're not giving any details.

I sure if you're standing on train tracks at the right time, nothing will happen either. it all depends.

Here is the story

zugzug @ 31:

for those people here who might not know any better, there are lots of types of "radiation" that could be leaked that would become entirely harmless once diluted into the ocean.

It depends a lot on what happened, and they're not giving any details.

zugzug, radiation doesn/t get "diluted into the ocean." Radiation stays radioactive for whatever it's half-life is... which might be a few seconds... and it might be a half-a-million years. Depends upon what kind of radioactive material it is.

But it doesn't get diluted... it just drifts SOMEWHERE ELSE.

CowBoy Bob in Austin @ 22:

I have just ONE WORD for all you NEO CON CRAZIES out there who are going to want to minimize and mitigate this... and the prospects of increased use of NUCLEAR for power generation:

CANCER

You might want to look up how many people die every year from airpollution caused by coal plants alone. Nuclear energy is much safer for public health, deal with it.

Overreacting to this very minor event doesn't help our credibility. Too many real issues to deal with. Let's focus on things we can do something about - like putting adults back in control of the government.

ahoj (at 39)

Yup... Chernobyl should have been IN RESPONSE NUMER ONE!

You sound like you know something about radiation... then you suggest that the whole industry is SAVE because THE WASTE IS CONTROLLED.
They didn't control the waste so good at Three Mile Island, did they?
They didn't control the waste so good at Hanford, did they?

So when did you say you will be offering YOUR BACK YARD to serve as the first official licensed nuclear waste storage facility?

bago @ 43:

Also, there's that giant nuclear h-bomb in the sky that's been constantly exploding for a few billion years now. What do they call it again? I think it starts with the letter s.

his name is Sol

Japan is going to be so pissed off.

Of all the countries in the world why oh why did this have to happen to Japan?

Damn...not enough to crib notes from Nazis, now they wanna pretend that it's August 1945 all over again.

CowBoy Bob in Austin @ 44:

ahoj (at 39)

They didn't control the waste so good at Three Mile Island, did they?

Actually, that incident showed that even though pretty much all humans in the process made stupid mistakes, nobody got hurt.

So when did you say you will be offering YOUR BACK YARD to serve as the first official licensed nuclear waste storage facility?

Fine by me, most of the nuclear waste that we'll ever create is already here anyway, modern plant designs can work without waste and can even process our current waste.

You're just an uninformed alarmist troll, spouting the usual nonsense and not doing anyone any good.

JFK @ 51:

Do we really want Godzilla to kick the shit out of Tokyo?

A 200-foot T. Rex would burst the moment it took a step, if it didn't die of cancer or have all flesh seared off it first.

Dutch Delight @ 52:

CowBoy Bob in Austin @ 44:

ahoj (at 39)

They didn't control the waste so good at Three Mile Island, did they?

Actually, that incident showed that even though pretty much all humans in the process made stupid mistakes, nobody got hurt.

Nobody got hurt? What about the 2000 injured parties that could not get their day in court?

"The lawsuit, filed by 2,000 plaintiffs against the utility, was later dismissed when the court found they couldn't prove their claims. The following quote refers to the study I cited in #49 by an epiodemiologist at the University of North Carolina:

"...Wing said he found it ironic that U.S. District Court Judge Sylvia Rambo, admistrator of the Fund, dismissed those thousands of damage claims filed against the power plant by nearby residents last year citing a "paucity of proof" to support their cases.

"Judge Rambo spent a year or more throwing out scientific evidence presented by the plaintiffs," he said. "After she threw out the evidence that people had been injured by the accident, including part of our work, then she ruled that there wasn't enough to proceed with the case."

This is obviously a case of WHITEWASH by the government in order to prevent a catastrophic loss of confidence.

So when did you say you will be offering YOUR BACK YARD to serve as the first official licensed nuclear waste storage facility?

Fine by me, most of the nuclear waste that we'll ever create is already here anyway, modern plant designs can work without waste and can even process our current waste.

This comment tells me that you don't really understand the "breeder reactor" process, and that you have bought into the lies and drunk the KOOL-AID administered by the nuclear industry.

You're just an uninformed alarmist troll, spouting the usual nonsense and not doing anyone any good.

There's always a first... and tonight this is the first time that I have ever been so insulted. If you can't take the HEAT of honest sparring... and some exposure to HISTORICAL FACT and documentation with credible research that counters your own FALSE URBAN LEGENDS... then you can take your "uninformed alarmist troll" insult and STICK IT.

I've been aware of the industry lies and government cover-ups surrounding the nuclear industry for THIRTY YEARS. I've known people who have died as a result of exposure to accidentally released radioactive materials. I have been personally involved in the PREVENTION OF LICENSEING for new facilities... and I will continue to do so. THAT's the "good" that I can claim as a result of my INFORMED, POSITIVE, FACT-BASED AGENDA.

What have YOU done for ME lately?

This is stupid.

An American sub stops for a few days with a small radiation leak in Japanese waters, and everybody is worried about the Japanese fish, and yet not one word of concern for the few hundred American sailors who worked, ate, and slept within close proximty of the radiation leak for several months straight.

Priorities people.

Lets learn something before we panic, shall we? Go get an X-ray or something.

@59
France has been capable with this because of education. many people in the US fear anything nuclear.
And considering prevailing attitudes of corporations (profits of safety at times) and government (big, nasty, and has been know to let people die for military experiments) some of this fear is not unwarranted. However, it is safe and clean if you can get the whole system working right. You need damn good regulation, an educated populous (so they know what is going on to both give their consent and feel safe with it.), and corporations that aren't making profits the bottom line.

the reason why we have had problems with nuclear power is three fold. 1. we have had issues with this in the past, and there is a segment of the population who can say they have been effected by radiation leaks (down winders). 2. we have federalism. Each state passed the buck because of the possibilities of problems with this. If any politician let the storage location in their district/state the would be out of a job. the buck was passed so much over the years, and all the storage spaces at the reactors were filling up (as they were only meant to hold the material for as long as they needed the high levels of containment) that we are getting stuck with yucca mountain. Now it being on a fault line isn't great, but it is out of the way. Eventually we might be able to reuse some of this, but that goes into the re-refinement ban that carter signed, and is more than I should go into. 3. education on science across america is very very poor. When people talk about evolution debates they completely miss over large areas of the US where the teachers and principles just won't teach is because they don't believe it or it is controversial. Nuclear power is no different in the types of attitudes you see (not to equate people believing in nuclear power with evolutions believes, just drawing parallels). We would need a national effort to explain what happens at every step to all americans. to give them all the pros and cons. In my opinion I think the pros out weigh the cons, and that is after years of science education.

people don't understand how close they are to some of these things. My home town of Madison Wisconsin has a nuclear reactor sitting down town at the university. it doesn't generate power, it is for training only. There has been no incidents there, it is very much safe. (I should know, I worked next door to it in high school). Now imagine what would happened if the mayor of madison informed the general population of madison that we have had a functioning reactor down town for the last 40 or so years. I am pretty sure a large number of people, who don't know enough about it, and didn't know it was there, would flip out. It's not a secret, it is just hidden in plain site.

if we can get our science education up higher, and teach the effects of more advanced technologies, and how they can effect us we might be more understanding of them. Right now, nuclear energy isn't on a standardized test, so the population is getting no child left behinded.

Among those in the most direct path of the plumes, lung cancer incidence went up by 300 to 400 percent, and leukemia rates were up by 600 to 700 percent.

And that is the type of staement that is utterly meaningless. Know why? Take a second...c'mon, think about it...

You don't say what it went up from.

Without knowing what the absolute numbers, that type of statement makes it absolutely impossible to judge actual risk. If your baseline is 100 people, and the numbers were 3 before, 9 or 12 after, well, that's pretty significant. If before it averaged 1 person with lung cancer, and now it's 4, yes, the odds of getting it quadrupled. And the odds of not getting it dropped from 99% to 96%. Not quite as scary, is it? But wait, it gets better! Was the baseline 1 in 1000? Now increasing that 400% increases your odds of lung cancer from .1% to .4%. Well, not really scary at all, is it? Was the baseline 1 in 10,000? In which case, the odds of not getting lung cancer are 99.96%, even with a 400% increase.

This type of bad math is a common way of lying with statistics.

Leave it to the Bush administration to break **FIFTY-FOUR** incident-free years of nuclear-powered US Navy. Un. Be. Lie. Va. Ble.

CowBoy Bob in Austin @ 49:

Where are the government subsidies for Solar power generation... and Geo-thermal... and WIND POWER? Why this constant lying and intimidation about the "relative benefits of nuclear?" I call bullshit.

I'm all for subsidies that can, and will eventually, make solar, geothermal, wind power viable - but all the current power production right now from all those things is like a nine-volt battery compared to what *one* nuclear power plant can produce. We need power, and we need carbon-free power that doesn't cause us to go in debt to foreign interests to pay for it, and we're going to need it for quite a while until we *do* finally get solar/geothermal/wind/wave/people walking down the sidewalk/people driving metal cars past magnets power up to speed. Quite a while.

CowBoy Bob in Austin @ 22:

I have just ONE WORD for all you NEO CON CRAZIES out there who are going to want to minimize and mitigate this... and the prospects of increased use of NUCLEAR for power generation:
CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER.

So a Chernobyl or a Three Mile Island (still no proof anyone got cancer there btw) is what it takes to get cancer from a nuclear reactor?

Sign me up for one in my back yard!! There have been billions of reactor-hours producing trillions of megawatts of power since the early 50s, and Chernobyl is still the only incident that caused any problems, and only because the people running it were MORONS. Compared to what other methods of power generation will do, gimme nuclear any day at ALL!

CowBoy Bob in Austin @ 22:

I have just ONE WORD for all you NEO CON CRAZIES out there who are going to want to minimize and mitigate this... and the prospects of increased use of NUCLEAR for power generation:

....... CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER, CANCER.

Do I have to repeat myself?

I hope you get this worked up over people who smoke, don't exercise, or have a poor diet.

oncall @ 59:

There seems to be some people who are well informed about nuclear energy posting in this thread. I was wondering if anybody can explain why the French have been so successful with the nuclear energy program? I recall seeing a PBS documentary that showed that the French had worked out way to store the spent fuel rods.

That's easy: It's nationalized and devoid of the profit motive. It's the same reason our nuclear navy is, despite what you might think from this thread, so reliable. The French government spends the money, out of general tax revenues and power sales, to do it right. They have a uniform design. Also, they recyle their spent materials.

We needn't worry about growth of our "private sector" nuclear industry. Absent massive government subsidies and a captive utility rate base that has no say in the issue, nuclear power is economically non-viable and non-competitive with all other means of producing power, including solar photo-cells. The cost of the fuel is fairly cheap, but when you add up the total embedded cost called the "bus-bar" cost (capital, cost of capital, capital upkeep, labor, security, compliance, decommisioning, waste management, spent fuels, ad infinitum..), it's the most expensive power imaginable. Nothing else is even remotely close. The utilities that have nukes can only afford them, because the have a monopoly in their franchise area with customers who have no choice, and they have other, much cheaper units against which they can average down their aggregate kilowatt costs. In an unregulated electricity market, the utilities with nukes would be going broke.

Despite the BS the nuke-owning utilities spew, they know that their nukes are white elephants that only put them further into the hole everyday they own one, every day they operate one. Upkeep expenses accrue faster than the original purchase price can be paid down, even with depreciation offsets. The utilities that own them, wish they'd never heard of nukes, and live in terror of being deregulated and losing their captive rate payers and of losing government subsidies. The way they all got involved in nukes was from an industry-wide kind of insanity in the 60's and 70's. In essence, it was a competition that executives were waging, one utility against the other, for bragging rights, all so that one CEO could say to all others: "Not only is my dick bigger than yours, but I have three of them.". Big time players, they. By the time the bubble burst in the early 80's, the utilities that ended up being in the best shape were the ones that avoided playing that stupid game altogether and never built any nukes.

Unless the government is going to build, own and operate nuke plants, nuclear is dead in this country.

forge @ 73:

CowBoy Bob in Austin @ 38:

zugzug, radiation doesn/t get "diluted into the ocean." Radiation stays radioactive for whatever it's half-life is... which might be a few seconds... and it might be a half-a-million years. Depends upon what kind of radioactive material it is.

But it doesn't get diluted... it just drifts SOMEWHERE ELSE.

Bob, Google the term "parts per million" before you post anything else that makes you seem even more foolish.

Hey forge, buddie-old-pal,

Here's a weekend assignment for ya: DEFINE FOOLISH.
I'll give you a little head start for your google button:

lead in paint,
PCB's in patroleum products,
arsenic in wood products,
formeldehyde in FEMA trailers,
DDT on farm crops.
Buying a HUMMER as a family car,
over-fishing the oceans,
building tires that blow up when they get hot
building SUVs that roll over when their tires blow up,

Don't you get it?
The sacred GOD, PROFIT, makes weak men do stupid things.
Your intended insult regarding the term "parts per million" makes you sound like one.

@ #76

Wow, talk about moving the goal post.

US Navy nuclear power plants are the safest, best designed, and best run nuke plants anywhere on this planet. The Pentagon lies through it's teeth. They do it all the time. The ENLISTED sailors that run, maintain and repair the powerplants aren't going to lie about dangerous radiation levels because they don't want to die. The Navy has programs that continually monitor radiation levels throughout the ship and it's personal.

I haven't read all the posts, However this type of news story tends to create hysteria. First of all there is a difference between radiation exposure and contamination. Exposure is when someone stands next to a jar of the aforementioned water, contamination is when you get splashed with it. If anyone needs to know, contamination is worse, after it happens a whole lot of scrubbing goes on afterwards.Any contaminated water spilled into the ocean not highly radioactive will dilute and become less of a risk. Sailors on patrol have more risk of exposure to contamination I would guess than any Japanese civilians. While the spill is nothing to take lightly, the level of near hysteria I've read here, blows everything out of proportion.

CowBoy Bob in Austin @ 38:

zugzug @ 31:

for those people here who might not know any better, there are lots of types of "radiation" that could be leaked that would become entirely harmless once diluted into the ocean.

It depends a lot on what happened, and they're not giving any details.

zugzug, radiation doesn/t get "diluted into the ocean." Radiation stays radioactive for whatever it's half-life is... which might be a few seconds... and it might be a half-a-million years. Depends upon what kind of radioactive material it is.

But it doesn't get diluted... it just drifts SOMEWHERE ELSE.

it depends on what it is. if it's heavy water then it absolutely gets diluted. If it's a uranium rod then it won't. The fact that it got out through the piping makes me think it is something soluble or at least very small particles.

WE ALL LOVE A LITTLE BUSH @ 25:

virtually undetectable.virtually undetectable.virtually undetectable.virtually undetectable.virtually undetectable

AND YET WE COULD DETECT THAT IT LEAKED...

i guess when all the virtual fish float to the virtual surface of the virtual ocean.... the only people who will notice it will be-----
WEARING UNDERWARE SITTING IN THEIR MOM'S BASEMENT PLAYING WORLD OF WARCRAFT

sure glad it only happened in some virtual world and not here where we live...IN REALITY

We can tell water's been leaked because before it is discharged it is held in a tank with a level detector. When that level goes down mysteriously then odds are there's not a thirsty dude in the tank.

D @ 87:

that last comment didn't quote well. My paragraph is the last one only.

Well, there's something else to consider as well (that the ranter obviously either hasn't, or is too stupid to know): we can detect a lot of things at levels far below the point where they are actually doing anything other than barely existing.

"Citics" even.

virtually undetectable

Just like Bushes IQ.....

As probably the only nuclear (power) qualified submariners on this blog, let me tell you that this is no big deal. It's more political than technical. Hell, we can discharge primary coolant 12 miles from land, anywhere. Moreover, primary coolant is only marginally radioactive. A chest or dental xray, or your granite countertops provide more occupational exposure. Admiral Rickover actually brought some primary coolant to a congressional hearing and drank some of it. The leakage was probably a couple of teaspoons. Hell, the Thresher and Scorpion are at the bottom of the ocean with fully intact nuclear propulsion systems. After 40+ years, no measurable leakage or radiation has been detected. Not to mention all the former Soviet ones on the bottom.

The Chemist @ 78:

@ #76

Wow, talk about moving the goal post.

Chemist, and forge,

I admit that I didn't just move the goal post... I sort of tore it out of the ground and threw it over the horizon... and I appologize for the double posting. In my haste I did not see the first post right away... then ten minutes later wrote it again... My wife tells me to slow down and take a breath once in a while.

Two things:

I was deeply insulted for being accused of not knowing about parts per million. Small things that SOUND trivial, sometimes ARE NOT.

Also, I was deeply disappointed that so many posters were so eager to repeat the LIE that no one was harmed at Three Mile Island. That, simply, is an effort to re-write history... and it is an example of blindly following the "official" government version of the event... when the local officials wanted nothing more than to have the whole event just go away.

I have to admit that I learned some things through the more thoughtful posts in this thread, and certainly I have more to learn about the current state of nuclear power production. I will always have serious doubts about the abiliy of the American version of this industry to be able to translate the apparent success of the French government into our economy and corporate structure. See, we don't have the luxury of the liberal government oversight of the French. That's just one point. No regrets. I truely hope my scepticism rubs off on as many readers as possible... even though the pro-nuke crowd here did their best to make me out to be an old useless RANTING nay-sayer.

A quick glance into the FABULOUS WORLD of the French Nuclear Industry... and what do you know?? SEVENTY-FOUR KILOS of uranium is leaked into the French countryside!

That's about one hundred and fifty POUNDS of some of the most TOXIC SHIT ON EARTH. Here's a quick link... and some of the points being reported:

http://www.greenpeace.org/international/news/french-nuclear-industry-sue...

July 7, 11PM, over 74 kilos of uranium is leaked into the environment from Tricastin;
July 8, 7AM, eight hours later the authorities are informed;
July 8, 1PM, Restrictions on fishing, bathing and drinking local water are introduced 14 hours after the accident;
July 17, investigation of the leak reveals that there is more radioactivity present than the leak could have caused. Further investigation suggests that the military, who stored radioactive material at the site underground without proper containment in the 60’s and 70’s could be to blame;
July 23, a leaking pipe results in 100 workers being exposed to radioactive particles from a leaking pipe;
July 29, a false alarm results in 120 workers being evacuated, tests show that 45 employees have traces of radiation on them from the previous weeks’ leak.

So, tell me again how I should GET REAL... and learn about parts per million... and not act like such a FOOL.

I spent 12 years in the submarine force and know that they are safe! I would go to sea on the Houston today if I had orders to her. By the way the USS Houston is a "Fast Attack" Submarine not a "Boomer" in case anyone in this site is concerned with the facts. Compared to the rest of the world our military safety record is awesome. All the sailors that I had the HONOR of serving with had safety first in their minds at all time. Most of the people that blog here probably have never spent time in the military and have no idea what an honor it is to serve your country knowing that it could end your life.  What you don't realize is that someone has to do it.  We can't all run to Canada when the going gets tough!

You should thank a Service Member instead of ripping on the worlds greatest Navy on a stupid blog!!! It is due to the sacrifice of these men and women that you even have a blog to complain on. I served in the military under both Clinton and Bush and I can say we were much better supported by President Bush than ever by Clinton.