Most people fear lava when they think about volcanoes. Lava kills almost no one — it moves at 5 mph and you can walk away from it. The real killers are pyroclastic flows (700°C gas clouds moving at 450 mph), volcanic ash (which collapses roofs and destroys engines), toxic gas emissions, and lahars (volcanic mudflows …
In a nuclear emergency, the decisions made in the first 15 minutes determine outcomes. Whether the event is a nuclear plant accident, a radiological dirty bomb in a nearby city, or — in the worst case — a nuclear detonation, the survival advantage goes to people who already know what to do and have the …
The first thing that fails in a major emergency is usually the cell network. It doesn’t go down because the towers are destroyed — it goes down because thousands of people in the same area try to call simultaneously, and the system gets overwhelmed. During Hurricane Sandy, cell networks in some areas were congested for …