By the author of Street Survivalism: A Practical Training Guide To Life In The City and The Ultimate Survival Gear Handbook
The latest “thing of the moment” is the mysterious drone sightings in New Jersey and East Coast airspace. It has the right combination of factors to go viral in a matter of days, sparking the wildest explanations and craziest theories. And so it did.
Earlier this week, I posted on X (@StoicFabian) it looked like another distraction, much like the Chinese Balloon story that caused similar commotion in the early months of 2023.
I didn’t mean to sound like squads of drones suddenly flying day and night in formation over an area is routine or unimportant, just that the mass hysteria is unreasonable and unjustified. I’m an RC hobbyist and certified drone pilot myself. We use UAVs in engineering to perform a variety of tasks such as terrain surveys, topographic maps, structure analysis, and lots more.
These things are everywhere nowadays, from hobby flying to aerial photography, as well as in agriculture, and search and rescue… So what is this about?
I have no idea.
The evasive declarations by the U.S. government added gasoline to the speculation and conspiracy theories. Everybody from Joe Rogan to experts in all fields chimed in. We may never know for sure; this can turn into something, or fade away like so many other “issues”.
Missing radioactive material?
What motivated me to write about the episode was the declaration of New Jersey’s Belleville mayor, Michael Melham, that these drones could be “searching for missing radioactive material.”
Drones can be equipped with special sensors that detect radioactive particles, thermal signatures, and more from the air. They can be programmed to fly a grid automatically, covering large areas quickly. Even in the dark – though flying drones at night isn’t common, admittedly.
So, on the surface, someone (the government or whoever) using UAVs to “sniff out” something out there is in the realm of “probable,” however unusual or even suspicious.
Or, that could be an extra-official theory thrown out there by the authorities to avoid panic and satisfy the population, though in this case, I’d argue that “missing radioactive material” has a broad, broad meaning. It could be something small and relatively innocuous, but also a nuclear head gone astray.
The threat of “civil” radioactive material causing a small or medium-sized SHTF is real – so real, it happened in my country almost 40 years ago.
Everybody heard about Chernobyl, Fukushima, and Three Mile Island nuclear accidents. However, civil radioactive devices are also fairly ubiquitous in urban centers, where even a minor disaster can have severe consequences and affect a large area and population.
Even if the effects are limited and quickly contained, the psychological impact on the population can be deep and long-lasting. Panic can ensue. There are also legal, financial and economic implications and developments that can last for decades.
The Goiânia Accident
That’s the case of the 1987 Goiânia Accident, when an unsecured radiotherapy unit was stolen from an abandoned hospital site in the capital of Goiás state in central Brazil, and its Cesium-137 capsule opened and exposed.
That event resulted in four deaths and 229 contaminated. More than 112,000 in a city of 1.2 million people had to be examined and monitored. Twenty people showed signs of radiation sickness and required treatment.
Several buildings were demolished, and the topsoil of a large area was removed in the cleanup operation. Thousands of personal belongings were seized and then burned.
News of the incident was broadcast on local, national, and international media, prompting nearly 130,000 people in Goiânia to flood local hospitals concerned that they might have been exposed. People freak out on news of “invisible” threats like that. (Remember the Ebola panic in 2014?)
How things hit the fan
Things hit the fan via a succession of smaller disasters compounding into a nightmarish scenario.
The building from which the equipment was taken was impounded due to a dispute between the owner, its former occupant (a radiology institute), and the IICS, a representative of the institute employees. Four months before the theft, a director of the IICS used police force to prevent one of the tenants from removing the radioactive material that had been left behind.
The former tenant then warned the president of the IICS that he should take responsibility “for what would happen with the Cesium bomb.” The building owner went the same way, writing several letters to the National Nuclear Energy Commission (CNEN) to warn about the danger of keeping a teletherapy unit at an abandoned site, stating that they could not remove the equipment due to a court order.
The State Court posted a security guard to protect the premises. However, on September 13, the guard didn’t show up. Two scavengers entered the partially demolished building and disassembled an X-ray unit, taking the emitting head to their junkyard in a wheelbarrow. It was relatively small and heavy; scrap is sold by weight, so they thought they’d hit a home run.
Back at their junkyard, the two managed to pry open the head unit’s emitting enclosure, unaware of the content. After messing with the piece the entire morning, they started feeling sick that afternoon. In the following days, they kept tampering with the thing, finally rupturing the lead protection and exposing the Cesium-137 entirely.
After fiddling with it for a while, they resold the emitting head to another scrapyard. It kept changing hands for the next two weeks, each time having more of the radioactive grains removed by its handlers. Everybody was mesmerized by the bluish light coming out of the device and the dust, an effect of the Cherenkov Radiation.
“The lovely phosphorescent powder was unlike anything Leide das Neves Ferreira, 6, had ever seen. Her father, a junk dealer in the Brazilian city of Goiania, discovered the mysterious substance when he pried open a heavy lead casing that a scavenger had sold him. Leide rubbed the powder on her body so that she glowed and sparkled. Dust fell on the sandwich she was eating.
Leide, her father and the scrap collector were in critical condition at a Rio de Janeiro hospital last week, not expected to survive. An additional 20 or so people were also hospitalized, most of them relatives and neighbors of Leide’s father who had carried away traces of the powder on their skin and clothes.
The glittery stuff proved to be cesium-137, a radioactive isotope used in cancer-therapy equipment. The scrap collector found the casing a month ago in a spot where a radiotherapy clinic had once stood.” [SOURCE]
All those people who came into contact with or near the leaking piece started feeling sick hours after messing with it. The doctors who tended to them during those days thought it was food poisoning or something else. No one suspected a radiation leak, much less of that magnitude.
On September 29, the authorities finally became aware of the contamination after a visiting medical physicist used a scintillation counter to confirm the presence of radioactivity in the sick people being admitted to the hospital and warned the government agencies.
The rest is history. That’s how these things happen.
How can we prepare for something like that?
As evidenced by the facts, the Goiânia Accident was a succession of judicial f*ckery, bureaucratic negligence, utter ignorance, and a good dose of Thirdworldization. That damaging combination can be a more common combination than people think.
Therefore, one way to prepare is to stay well-informed and knowledgeable. Start with potential sources of radiation in our area. For instance, I live in an apartment next to a couple of commercial buildings filled with dentists’ offices and radiology institutes in that same building.
I cannot do much about that other than move to a safer area, but that may not be possible or practical for everyone. It comes down to risk assessment: how are these places managed? A run-down premise presents a different level of radioactive threat than a well-cared and secure one. Fortunately, the buildings and clinics in my area are OK. Gathering information is also low-risk and low-investment, so it pays to know.
Second, be knowledgeable on how to deal with it if something happens. I’d point to “Nuclear Survival With An NBC Specialist” webinar, available at The OP’s Self Reliance & Survival learning center. It’s focused on a nuclear strike or dirty bomb, but the information and tips on medications, radiation facts, and decontamination work the same for civil accidents like the one related.
The dangerous part of radioactive accidents is the difficulty to detect leaks without proper equipment, or until it has spread and the effects start showing up. Unlike chemicals, gas, or other substances, which are usually followed by smoke, fire, smell, or some other signal that prompts immediate warning and action. A detection device at home may be good if you think there’s enough radioactive risk where you live.
Finally, it doesn’t hurt to be ready to bug in and also to bug out. The first rule of survival is “not being there,” so if something happens, being ready to leave at the first news of something bad can improve our chances of coming out unscathed.
As for these drones and similar events, it may be worth following, like many other issues, but from a distance. A bunch of surveying drones flying constantly over an area could indicate something is going on. As mentioned, it could be a survey, a rescue party, or a film shooting, though in those cases, the operation would be registered and operators knew (if it’s something official and legal).
Conclusion
The story of the Goiânia Cesium-137 Accident shows how reality can be a lot more mundane than some doomsday preppers would admit. Big accidents and impactful events happen, sure. Crazy stuff happens. The world is a pretty crazy place right now, there’s no shortage of bizarre things going on everywhere, their frequency and craziness seemingly increasing with passing time.
However, overreacting or freaking out isn’t sensible. Almost two years later, we haven’t even been given a convincing, logical, plausible official explanation for the balloon thing; the same could happen with this drone episode. It could be anything from a hoax or psyop to an alien invasion. We may never know for sure. That’s the world we’re living in right now.
Any uncommon activity in your area should be checked. If you think something looks weird, go check yourself. Or not. Just don’t waste time reading everyone else’s and their dog’s opinions for weeks on end. It’s unproductive and can lead to paranoia or paralysis. Stay grounded and focused on more important things.
What do you think?
Do you have a theory about the drones on the East Coast? Do you think it’s related to radioactive material? Have you seen the drones yourself?
Let’s discuss it in the comments section.
About Fabian
Fabian Ommar is a 50-year-old middle-class worker living in São Paulo, Brazil. Far from being the super-tactical or highly trained military survivor type, he is the average joe who since his youth has been involved with self-reliance and outdoor activities and the practical side of balancing life between a big city and rural/wilderness settings. Since the 2008 world economic crisis, he has been training and helping others in his area to become better prepared for the “constant, slow-burning SHTF” of living in a 3rd world country.
Fabian’s ebook, Street Survivalism: A Practical Training Guide To Life In The City , is a practical training method for common city dwellers based on the lifestyle of the homeless (real-life survivors) to be more psychologically, mentally, and physically prepared to deal with the harsh reality of the streets during normal or difficult times. He’s also the author of The Ultimate Survival Gear Handbook.
You can follow Fabian on Instagram @stoicsurvivor
I have been following a well connected person who has worked for the CIA, Pentagon and government. He’s a lawyer and an Economist. He thinks the government is looking for people who are planning a dirty bomb with radioactive materials. My idea is it’s for NY City new years eve or the inauguration on January 20
When the government actually admits that there is missing radiological material you know that they are trapped. Not that I believe for a minute that they are expending this kind of effort for some missing Cat.3 X-ray calibration material. BUT! This allows them to continue their activities, and gives them an excuse that won’t panic the population.