Runit Island, home to a nuclear graveyard, is in serious danger. What is happening to the concrete structure?
The Cold War, which took place after the Second World War, was a conflict in which there was hardly any violence as such. The episodes were mainly based on showing the other side cutting-edge technologies on various fronts. Of course, the military was always ahead and, therefore, this period has seen more nuclear denotations than any other. United States and the Soviet Union carried out multiple tests until, finally, this second part executed the Tsar bomb, the biggest denotation that had ever been made. There was even a nuclear bomb that could fit in a simple backpack!
This has caused various spaces around the world to be described as authentic nuclear coffins. On the part of the United States, some of these experiments were conducted in areas of the Pacific, far from civilizations. Radioactive material can remain operational for thousands of years, so areas with potential zero or, in the worst-case scenario, very low population density were chosen. The emission of radiation is very harmful to health, something that could be verified in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Let’s see, now, what is happening in one of these nuclear coffins, why is living a somewhat compromised situation due to material leaks that could be taking place and, of course, to what extent this may compromise the surrounding biodiversity and, of course, the waters in the vicinity of the test site that took place during part of the 20th century .
A nuclear coffin in the middle of the Pacific could be deteriorating dangerously
Runit Island was the subject of one of the tests carried out by the United States regarding atomic bombs. He The last nuclear test took place in 1958. and, after that, it was decided to wall off the crater area in order to avoid any possible radiation leak. What is the current drawback? As usually happens with all types of facilities, maintenance must be carried out from time to time, since structural problems may appear. In this particular case, somewhat suspicious cracks have begun to appear.
It should be noted that it was decided to build the retaining wall with a thickness of 45 centimeters, but even so, cracks are emerging that only highlight the need to act on it before it is too late. For these purposes, it is necessary to mention, additionally, that this structure has dimensions of up to 115 meters wide, which demonstrates to what extent it is vitally important to keep inside all the radioactive material that has been since the detonation.
It is believed that the porous coral rock could be leaking some of the radioactive material inside the sealed room. This could lead to a large-scale deterioration of the ecosystem around the island, so studies are being carried out to analyze the causes of the appearance of the cracks and, of course, what chance is there that they will grow from now on.
Among the reasons that are being claimed as possible accelerators of the wear and tear process would be sea level rise, which may pose a serious risk to the structure in the medium term. Among the many radioactive materials that exist is plutonium-239, one of the most dangerous that human beings have ever known.
It should be noted that from 1947 to 1958, up to 67 nuclear tests were carried out in the areaaccording to the Phys information. The Marshall Islands concentrated a large part of these tests and, as a consequence, they had to create this kind of cemeteries with this material that now, a few decades later, continue to pose problems that require the attention of the scientific community.