Alaskans must demand AK state government, DEC (Department of Environmental Conservation) sign into law and implement radiation testing procedures and protocols for all salmon caught in AK waters
ENERGY NEWS
11/23/2013
Billings Gazette, Nov. 18, 2013: Jared Jansen [...] said, he and his father, Mike, have seen up to 100 dead deer at a time along the Musselshell River. [...] die-offs have whittled the once hardy deer herds down to a handful [...] “I’ve only seen three does this year. [...] It used to be when I was haying along the river, early in the morning, I’d see 200 to 500 head in the meadows.” [...]
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Irradiated Alaskan salmon now on the menu |
The names sound like something out of a science fiction thriller: epizootic hemorrhagic disease, sylvatic plague, bluetongue, brucellosis, chytrid, chronic wasting disease [...] Yet the all-too-real afflictions threaten to reduce the populations of wild mammals, birds and reptiles across Montana, Wyoming and other regions [...] “There is a general consensus among scientists that we are seeing more disease,” said Jonathan Sleeman, director of the U.S. Geological Survey’s National Wildlife Health Center in Madison, Wis. [...] so many diseases afflicting such a wide variety of animals [...] A study is being conducted in northwestern Montana to examine the possible causes [...]
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Alaska Grizzly and Black bears will accumulate radiation in their fat and internal organs from eating salmon |
Independent Record, Oct. 31, 2013: What’s happening to all the moose? Moose in the northern United States are dying in what scientists say may be the start of climate shock [...] The die-off is most dire in Minnesota, where ecologists say moose could be gone within a decade. [...]
Concerns have prompted a 10-year study of moose in Montana [...] It’s not just in Montana, either. [...] An aerial survey of moose in northeastern Minnesota earlier this year showed a 52 percent drop in population since 2010, which prompted the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources to completely call off the 2013 moose hunting season [...]
In various regions of British Columbia [Canada], populations have declined anywhere from 20 to 70 percent in recent years. [...]
In Montana [they're going] to monitor adult female survival, pregnancy and calf-survival rates. [...] They’re also monitoring the number of ticks on the moose, and use a portable ultrasound machine to measure the layer of rump fat. [...] The study also calls for sampling moose from across the state for genetics and parasites. [...]
Nick DeCesare, the Missoula-based lead biologist on the Montana study: “About one-third of our animals have no fat on their rump; that was in the winter, so that’s a pretty big deal [...] Are lean animals dying, not giving birth to calves or could they just be leaner this year and are doing fine next year?” [...] Three of the [36] collared moose already have died; one was killed by a wolf and the other two were in poor health. [...] “Having such a small sample to start with, then having three die, is a big deal.”
Dennis Murray, a population ecologist at Trent University in Canada: “The fact that you’ve got different proximate causes killing off the moose suggests there’s an underlying ultimate cause.”
Watch Montana Fish, Wildlife, & Park veterinarian Jennifer Ramsey explain some of the problems hereTepco Adviser: Wait until Alaska salmon is found with Fukushima contamination, it’s only a matter of time — US Gov’t Report: “Radiation hot spots may occur… radioactive contaminants could remain a valid concern for years” (VIDEO)
Lake Barrett, former U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission official and now an adviser to Tepco, March 30, 2011 (at 36:00 in):
The environmental release is the growing challenge; you’re going to read more and more about it in the paper. Wait until the first cesium-137 shows up in Alaska salmon, which is only a matter of time. You’re going to find it right back in the headlines.
Congressional Research Service, 2012:
As it approaches the west coast of North America, the North Pacific Current splits into the southward California Current and the northward Alaska Current. Although these currents have the potential for bringing radiation from Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident to U.S. waters, their flow is slow [...]
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Both native and migratory bird species will be affected by Fukushima radiation |
Regardless of the slow flow, radioactive contaminants with long half-lives (e.g., cesium-137, with a half-life of about 30 years) could still pose concerns if transported over long distances by ocean currents. [...] Scientists at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution advised that radiation levels in seafood should continue to be monitored [...] there remains the slight potential for a relatively narrow corridor of highly contaminated water leading away from Japan and a very patchy distribution of contaminated fish―extensive monitoring will determine the exact dispersion of these radioactive contaminants. [...] It has been suggested that cesium-137 may move up the food chain and become concentrated in fish muscle or that radiation hot spots may occur. Another potential concern is related to accumulation of strontium-90 in fish bone [...] additional radiation from [Fukushima] might eventually also be detected in North Pacific waters under U.S. jurisdiction, even months after its release. Regardless of slow ocean transport, the long half-life of radioactive cesium isotopes means that radioactive contaminants could remain a valid concern for years.
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