Nuke disaster rekindles U.S. interest in fallout shelters

[AsahinaKimi]

Conceptional drawing of an underground shelter on sale in the U.S. (Photo provided by Vivos)

Backyard fallout shelters, once secretly built across America in the 1950s during the Cold War, are making a comeback, thanks to the accident at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.

The crisis, triggered by the March 11 Great East Japan Earthquake, led to a massive release of radioactivity into the atmosphere and has apparently raised renewed concerns among Americans about the possibility of similar radiation crises, if not atomic Armageddon, in their country.

Robert Vicino, the 58-year-old CEO and founder of Vivos, a company building nuclear bunkers in California, said the number of orders and inquiries his firm has received has increased tenfold since the crisis broke out at the Fukushima plant.

"We have about a 1,000 percent increase in immediate applications for memberships and accommodations in Vivos after the March 11 earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown in Japan," Vicino said.

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http://www.asahi.com/english/TKY201108200146.html
No more hiding under your desks, or going out into the school hallway with your coat over your head?
What the hell was that? Like that would keep you safe?

[7wo7rees]

1. Bunkers only work in a major ground zero strike.

What if the nuclear threat we've all faced for years comes in like a fog, on little cat's feet, and slowly creeps into our biosphere, slowly contaminating every part of life? No major war with nuclear-tipped missiles or atom bombs. Just seepage for years from Fukushima.

What, am I going live in the bunker forever? That's not living, that surviving. For what? To live underground with a bunch of rich Republicans you can never leave? Keep it.

[gateley]

2. How about closing down all reactors, securing the "trash" somehow

(which I think is ultimately futile), and not building any more?

OR, is this another "job creating" enterprise for the republicans?

[AsahinaKimi]

3. yeah seems kinda

a waste to have all that equipment (potentially dangerous) just to boil water. There are better ways.

[no_hypocrisy]

4. Nobody's explained to me how anyone could live in a shelter for decades

until the levels of radiation are "safe".

[Javaman]

8. and there's the rub no one ever wanted to talk about...

hell, what about the "fall out shelters" in the giant apartment buildings?

Many years ago, I worked at a Sears in my home town.

A buddy and I had to go down into the "sub basement" to get some holiday supplies that were stored down there. (this was in the very early 1980's).

And wouldn't you know, lo and behold, we found all these "supplies". It had been an old fall out shelter.

There were all these old tins of grossly expired "survival cookies" (I didn't want to know), boxes and boxes of "survival toilets" and a bunch of other crap. Most all of it were rusted and moldy.

What I thought interesting was: there was zero to read or things to distract ones mind among the many boxes of "supplies".

So, it's 1961, the bombs are falling, you run down to the shelter. You have food and you can poop. No water? Nothing to read? Just enough for one to sit and contemplate an easy way to commit suicide. LOL

[PoliticAverse]

5. Doesn't make a lot of sense. Better to spend the money on a small trailer to haul your belongings...

when you evacuate the area.

[Lucian]

6. Buying that is like buying snake oil.

No thanks. No thanks.

[Javaman]

7. Duck and Cover!

I'm still fascinated with that whole sub-section of how we Americans fed into the whole fallout shelter bullshit.

I still search out reports and findings of people who buy old homes and discover they have a long since buried shelter in their backyards.

Personally, speaking, I was wanting to put in a root cellar in my backyard, not for a war, but for my preserves. Does that count? LOL