I hope you are personally approaching the new year with hope and calm.
FBI Albany issued a public announcement on Jan 24 stating that “public need not be alarmed” about the multiagency nuclear training exercise taking place in and around Schenectady, with the presence of military aircraft and personnel, and people wearing protective equipment. It’s just a regularly scheduled biennial exercise.
The CDC has a website on “preparing for a radiation emergency.” Its repetitive advice is “get inside, stay inside, and stay tuned.” It conflates everything involving radiation from a nuclear power plant or transportation accident—which are extremely unlikely to be a public hazard aside from panic—to detonation of a nuclear weapon.
If there is a ground-burst nuclear weapon that creates heavy fallout (air bursts do not), just “getting inside” may not be adequate. You may need to improvise a core shelter for a few days.
Removing your outer clothing is neither necessary nor helpful if it is not contaminated with fallout or radioactive material. Getting external gamma radiation does not make you or your clothing radioactive.
Some CDC advice is applicable to ingesting contaminated food or water—but CDC does not discuss avoidance of such exposure. Thyroid protection with potassium iodide makes a lot of sense (and you should have some). CDC treatment advice includes Prussian blue, a prescription drug, not to be confused with artists’ supplies. This traps cesium or thallium. Your local pharmacy probably doesn’t stock it, but you should be able to get activated charcoal. This may help though CDC doesn’t mention it.
Other remedies that might help radiation sickness include high-dose vitamin C or dimethyl sulfoxide (DMS0).
We don’t know whether there is a specific reason for this exercise in Schenectady, but we should use it as a reminder to learn about radiation and improve our own preparedness. As people in North Carolina have learned, we cannot rely on FEMA.
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