Glow in the dark Grunie Pigs: Radioactive Wild Boars Wander Abroad – Three decades and seven hundred miles away from the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, wild boars containing high levels of radiation are being found roaming the German countryside. Officials reported that about one-third of 750 boars tested recently exceeded legal limits of radiation, particularly Caesium 137, but also note that the regulations are very strict. The Saxony boars are affected because their diets include plants (mushrooms, etc.) that store radiation from contaminated rains that fell after the 1986 disaster. Although the Chernobyl zone was closed to human habitation, animal life continues to flourish. Assessment: The fluidity of many of the earth’s natural features—air, water, weather, migratory animal species—offers elements that are unwilling and unable to be contained by political boundaries. As such, they offer conduits to transnational contaminants. For example, an Arizona river is now being monitored for toxic waste from a Mexican copper mine spill this summer; the San Pedro flows north into southern Arizona. Such untamable natural flows create conditions whereby calamity—accidental or intentional—can be carried across national borders.
Posted on: Sun, 28 Sep 2014 14:16:47 +0000