N.Y. Man Facing Life in Prison After Building Homemade "Death Ray"

[CrystalShadow]

Without periods, there would be no order. Every word will think it can just pass on its' responsibility to the next and be done. An endless chain of words until the reader passes out from thought exhaustion. We cannot have such madness on our pages. Triple periods...you see how they group together so neatly? That is what all commas are made from, triple periods. They...are the holy trinity of pause, without their pioneering teamwork, your anarchic commas would never exist. Ultimately, order must be maintained. Period.

Also, what the point of killing Obama now? Is he trying to become the next John Wilkes Booth?

I have seen images circling on social media claiming Obama is a muslim and should be tried in court for breaking the constitution. Now, I'm no expert on American law, but I'm quite certain that is an disturbed leap in logic.

OT: Must. Resist. Ranting. On. America's. Mental health issues! Urge. Too. Strong. Must. Murder. Chelsea. Bun!!

There's a certain subset of crazy idiots here who are convinced that Obama is a secret Muslim who was born in Kenya and can't legally be the president and they think he is a tyrant because they are too stupid to know how elections work. Yes I do have a fear of periods, COMMAS FOR LIFE!

Herasy! You commanist scum...praying at the alters of altered periods. Periods...assemble yourselves. We have ourselves a battle of punctuation ahead of us!

The commas have stood for the tyrant of the periods for long enough, we shall take what is rightfully ours and relegate the periods back where they belong, to the end of paragraphs where they can no longer do any harm.

Hey! Come now. Surely we can all get along peacefully, and share a semicolon or two; It truly does solve everything; except that it's hard to use correctly.

Semicolons forever!

OT: Wow. Someone trying build an X-ray weapon? That seems awfully contrived. Though I guess some people will try anything if they get it in their heads that someone else needs to die...

 

[J.McMillen]

Still, nice work there. It is probably not as difficult as I had first assumed but the use of a van confuses me since Xrays are effectively blocked by solid, dense objects like bone, stone, metal and concrete.

What about window glass? A passenger van with tinted windows could hide the unit while still allowing it to be used.

 

[crimson5pheonix]

It kinda of scary how he even got hold of radioactive material to make his doomsday device (like really, how which I guessing they are investigating on it).

May I point you to the "commercially available x-ray machines", you goose.

However, to generate the levels of radiation needed to irradiate people to the level of 1 Gray or more (the levels where the symptoms of radiation toxicity begin to emerge) would require the van to be sitting there for long periods of time or to emit the dosage in a large pulse which would cause some issues.

This got me thinking, how much power would actually be needed? Here [http://www.sprawls.org/ppmi2/XRAYPRO/#KV Effect] it says that emitted power increases with the square of the potential across the x-ray tube, and they give a value of about 13 mR/mAs at 100kV. Here [http://www.newcoinc.com/SearchResult.aspx?CategoryID=541] you can buy 450kV x-ray units. Using the square proportionality, this gives around 260 mR/mAs. The 450kV units are rated for 3400W. Using P=UI, this gives a current of roughly 8mA. This gives about 2R/s. So to reach 1Gy (100 Rad), we'd have to expose a person to this 450kV unit for no more than 50 seconds.

Of course in a real setup, the target person(s) would be far away, and I don't know how the angular distribution of the radiation behaves. Besides, they'd be shielded by walls. Then again, the cone of radiation would expose several people at once. Either way, 3400W can easily be pulled from a wall plug, so the power requirements aren't too high.

Well to throw to your maths, 4 gray is the LD[sub]50[/sub] for full body exposure. 8 gray nets you 100% mortality. I'm not an expert, but I'd guess that x-rays behave similarly to any light over distance for the sake of scattering.

EDIT: I didn't want to say inverse square until I was sure, but yes, inverse square. If I'm doing my maths right, then getting 1 gray over 3 meters would require you to output 9 gray, so I suppose that means you need to draw 30.6 kW?

 

[11zxcvb11]

am i the only one who thinks the "halal meat" truck is like the worst cover possible? if muslim neighborhoods are anything like jewish ones, people are always aware who are the kosher meat suppliers and a new face in town would be suspicious as hell.

 

[FalloutJack]

Well, it's a ray gun and it causes death. I guess it counts. The only thing I can really say is "What did they do with the weapon?".

 

[tzimize]

Hah, the first conviction of a terrorist making a dirty bomb, and it's a white American trying to terrorize Muslims. Also, what the point of killing Obama now? Is he trying to become the next John Wilkes Booth? When the clan thinks you're too bigoted and crazy, you know you have problems.

The problem with convicting muslim terrorists is that they are usually...you know...dead.

 

[Pinkamena]

It kinda of scary how he even got hold of radioactive material to make his doomsday device (like really, how which I guessing they are investigating on it).

May I point you to the "commercially available x-ray machines", you goose.

However, to generate the levels of radiation needed to irradiate people to the level of 1 Gray or more (the levels where the symptoms of radiation toxicity begin to emerge) would require the van to be sitting there for long periods of time or to emit the dosage in a large pulse which would cause some issues.

This got me thinking, how much power would actually be needed? Here [http://www.sprawls.org/ppmi2/XRAYPRO/#KV Effect] it says that emitted power increases with the square of the potential across the x-ray tube, and they give a value of about 13 mR/mAs at 100kV. Here [http://www.newcoinc.com/SearchResult.aspx?CategoryID=541] you can buy 450kV x-ray units. Using the square proportionality, this gives around 260 mR/mAs. The 450kV units are rated for 3400W. Using P=UI, this gives a current of roughly 8mA. This gives about 2R/s. So to reach 1Gy (100 Rad), we'd have to expose a person to this 450kV unit for no more than 50 seconds.

Of course in a real setup, the target person(s) would be far away, and I don't know how the angular distribution of the radiation behaves. Besides, they'd be shielded by walls. Then again, the cone of radiation would expose several people at once. Either way, 3400W can easily be pulled from a wall plug, so the power requirements aren't too high.

I'm impressed with your maths on this one, but I think you underestimate the dispersion of the radiation involved. In hospital environments with well set up machines the staff still wear lead aprons and go behind covers for safety while the machine is on, This is because, even when fired at a patient in a hospital, roughly 30% of the X ray photons scatter off into the room which indicates that the beam will disperse quickly with air and other obstacles in the environment. As well as that, I dug up the generally accepted doses for medical X rays:
[snip]
If a full body CT scan, which takes multiple Xray images at different angles around the entire body, only produces an effective dose in the patient of 10.6 mSv then either they use the machine like a flashbulb of some kind or they are not quite as powerful as you estimated.
Still, nice work there. It is probably not as difficult as I had first assumed but the use of a van confuses me since Xrays are effectively blocked by solid, dense objects like bone, stone, metal and concrete.

X-rays for medical imaging has much much lower flux and lower energy than that which is used for industrial applications (like the 450kV unit I linked). You are correct however that it would still be relatively effectively blocked by walls. A small aperture could be made in the side of the van to prevent unnecessary absorption and scattering by the van metal, and the "death ray" could be targeted at open-air events. The terrorist would not have to worry about getting a dose himself because of remote trigger. A lot of "innocents" i.e. not the target of the terrorist would also get quite a dose though because of scattering.

 

[SmugFrog]

An Upstate NY man was recently convicted by a federal court for building a "death ray" he planned to use to "massacre Muslims."

FBI, who then sent two undercover agents to provide him with an (inoperable) ray he had been seeking.

I think what's really interesting here is that the government GAVE him a supposedly broken or inoperable "Death Ray". So is he an idiot for not realizing how to get it working, not realizing it doesn't work, or thinking someone just has a "Death Ray" laying around somewhere?

 

[Neurotic Void Melody]

Hey! Come now. Surely we can all get along peacefully, and share a semicolon or two; It truly does solve everything; except that it's hard to use correctly.

Semicolons forever!

...;...

What in maker's name is this atrocity? Some ungodly hybrid of period and comma? What rituals were performed to create such...horrific results? Do not tell me you have been reading the forbidden tomes... not again? Bah! Let me fetch my rapier before it learns to reproduce like the colon before it.

 

[Strazdas]

Amateurs. They never seem to think things through. Perhaps thats why they get caught.... or perhaps their stupidity is what drives them to even attempt those acts to begin with. I guess we should be glad only stupid people do stupid things like that. stupid people are easier to catch.

If a full body CT scan, which takes multiple Xray images at different angles around the entire body, only produces an effective dose in the patient of 10.6 mSv then either they use the machine like a flashbulb of some kind or they are not quite as powerful as you estimated.

X-ray machines exposes your body to the waves for a couple of second. This person speculated that it would be on constantly for 50 seconds. thats thousands of times of X-ray scan. So the dosage would obviuosly be much higher. the question is can a machine sustain this for 50 seconds without overheating?

Glad he got caught, but one thing springs to mind. If they're trying him under a terrorism law, why is he not also being charged with terrorism? I completely agree he was trying to build a radiological weapon (and that he should be charged with terrorism), but it just seems odd to me they'd pick one but not the other.

Because all terrorists lives in caves in Afganistan and Iraq. you dont want to break this media narrative.

 

[fenrizz]

Amateurs. They never seem to think things through. Perhaps thats why they get caught.... or perhaps their stupidity is what drives them to even attempt those acts to begin with. I guess we should be glad only stupid people do stupid things like that. stupid people are easier to catch.

If a full body CT scan, which takes multiple Xray images at different angles around the entire body, only produces an effective dose in the patient of 10.6 mSv then either they use the machine like a flashbulb of some kind or they are not quite as powerful as you estimated.

X-ray machines exposes your body to the waves for a couple of second. This person speculated that it would be on constantly for 50 seconds. thats thousands of times of X-ray scan. So the dosage would obviuosly be much higher. the question is can a machine sustain this for 50 seconds without overheating?

Yes, most likely.
I work with industrial X-ray, and sometimes we need to expose for 30 minutes to 1.5 hours.
Although most of our equipment is 250kV max, and we suaully use 200kV or less.

Most of the equipment is air cooled, but liquid cooling is also possible.

 

[Therumancer]

Hah, the first conviction of a terrorist making a dirty bomb, and it's a white American trying to terrorize Muslims. Also, what the point of killing Obama now? Is he trying to become the next John Wilkes Booth? When the clan thinks you're too bigoted and crazy, you know you have problems.

Well to be fair from the way it reads they had already had their hooks into the Klan guy and he turned this guy in apparently as part as some kind of deal. If they Feds didn't have those hooks in we don't know how it would have went.

As far as the weapon goes my first thought was actually that if this is a functional idea, how long until we see something like it actually deployed?

Since the real sticking point here was access to an X-ray machine, imagine if instead of kit bashing the device from the commercial machine this guy apparently wanted you were able to design the needed parts from the ground up and miniaturize it into say a Drone. If it works at a range sufficient for a van drive by, just imagine being able to buzz people you don't like with a death drone and guarantee the deaths.... It doesn't require weaponized uranium or anything apparently, so say all we'd have to do is keep a drone in flight long enough to buzz someone like Putin, Castro, or any one of the more annoying Chinese officials and they could be lethally dosed with radiation. It would also be great to use on groups like ISIS.

I know, I know, I'm "Evil" and people here don't like the way I think or my politics but well... I couldn't see Obama being taken out by a Van with a "death ray" but I could in theory see it being done by a drone that didn't have to aim or fire a conventional gun. If you can get Obama, you can get similarly guarded people that have crossed the US.

... and just so you all sleep better, now that we know it's possible (since this says it was viable) if the US doesn't start doing it, our enemies will. Instead of a bomb like during the Boston marathon our Muslim "friends" can instead find friendly doctors attending their favorite mosques and then drive a modified ice cream truck through a neighborhood near you...

To be honest I sort of wish I hadn't read this, forget the guy, the potential for that as a weapon is kind of mind boggling, especially if all it takes is an electrician and an X-ray machine.

 

[Strazdas]

If a full body CT scan, which takes multiple Xray images at different angles around the entire body, only produces an effective dose in the patient of 10.6 mSv then either they use the machine like a flashbulb of some kind or they are not quite as powerful as you estimated.

X-ray machines exposes your body to the waves for a couple of second. This person speculated that it would be on constantly for 50 seconds. thats thousands of times of X-ray scan. So the dosage would obviuosly be much higher. the question is can a machine sustain this for 50 seconds without overheating?

Yes, most likely.
I work with industrial X-ray, and sometimes we need to expose for 30 minutes to 1.5 hours.
Although most of our equipment is 250kV max, and we suaully use 200kV or less.

Most of the equipment is air cooled, but liquid cooling is also possible.

Thanks for the info. A followup question though, are industrial X-rays that you use working in same way the ones person can freely buy does? Because industrial equipment are usually built a bit more sturdy than that for home use in most cases.

 

[Jadak]

Other aspects aside, this seems like a fairly stupid plan.

I mean, say all aspects of his plan work out as intended. How many people is he possible going to kill before someone noticed the string of fatal radiation deaths and tracked it back to the common source of the meat van?

Doesn't seem terribly effective, particularly considering the time involved in getting it set up.

 

[Hero in a half shell]

As serious as the threat was, I can't help myself but to imagine the guy with Skeletor's face, spouting something along the lines of "NEXT TIME, FBI! THE NEXT TIME, YOU WILL RUE THE DAY YOU CROSSED ME! NYAHAHAHAHAHA!"

I mean, this is bonkers enough to remind me of the old Crimson Ghost radio serials...

He was unmasked by 3 hippie teenagers and a Great Dane after getting stuck in a barrel during a chase, and he would have gotten away with it, if it wasn't for those pesky undercover Klan Agents.

 

[fenrizz]

If a full body CT scan, which takes multiple Xray images at different angles around the entire body, only produces an effective dose in the patient of 10.6 mSv then either they use the machine like a flashbulb of some kind or they are not quite as powerful as you estimated.

X-ray machines exposes your body to the waves for a couple of second. This person speculated that it would be on constantly for 50 seconds. thats thousands of times of X-ray scan. So the dosage would obviuosly be much higher. the question is can a machine sustain this for 50 seconds without overheating?

Yes, most likely.
I work with industrial X-ray, and sometimes we need to expose for 30 minutes to 1.5 hours.
Although most of our equipment is 250kV max, and we suaully use 200kV or less.

Most of the equipment is air cooled, but liquid cooling is also possible.

Thanks for the info. A followup question though, are industrial X-rays that you use working in same way the ones person can freely buy does? Because industrial equipment are usually built a bit more sturdy than that for home use in most cases.

Yes, they function in the same way.
There might be differences, but I've never encountered X-ray equipment for private use so it's hard to tell.

 

[fenrizz]

Still, nice work there. It is probably not as difficult as I had first assumed but the use of a van confuses me since Xrays are effectively blocked by solid, dense objects like bone, stone, metal and concrete.

Actually, the steel in a modern car would shield against very little.

If you have 450kV equipment, youn need over 10mm of steel to reduce the radiation to half value, and over 33mm of concrete to do the same.

 

[Politrukk]

"halal meat" a common food by muslims.


Halal is simply the manner in which the meat is treated I wouldn't call that a seperate food alltogether.


Well it's the first time I see Americans arrest someone for building a superweapon instead of trying to hire them.