Japan Tsunami Tons Of Debris Is Starting To Show Up In Alaska. Will It Hurt The Fishing Industry?

[LadyAuke]

Originally Posted by wildchild_to

I don't know if anyone is going to know the long term effect of what happened in Japan in the US.

Well, you're right. But, the key word in all of that is "trace"- we're talking about barely noticeable spikes in the background radiation.
What hasn't been mentioned here, but I think is relevant, is that it's important to keep this in perspective. Nuclear testing plus the fallout from Hiroshima/Nagasaki bombing increased the baseline level of radiation worldwide on a level that is statistically significant. They now use cesium dating to determine the age of objects in sealed containers, because the particular isotope of cesium that comes from nuclear fallout hasn't existed on earth for billions of years, until we went and introduced it back in the 40s and 50s. Now, our bodies and everything around us is saturated in it and that can be detected, the only place it can't be detected is in sealed containers that haven't been opened since before nuclear testing began. Think wine bottles.
Now, keeping all that in mind- the amount of radiation that will reach our shores from Fukushima is peas compared to that radiation. You get a bigger dose of radiation on one flight to Anchorage than you'll get in a lifetime from the fallout of Fukushima here in the US. It's that insignificant.