briefly a few facts to begin with maybe surprising to know that radiation is something we live with every day it has always been with us our own sun like each of our millions of stars is a raging nuclear practice that shoots out showers of tiny particles along with invisible rays that we call radiation in an average lifetime a person might expect to accumulate about ten times not enough to affect his health we don't worry about the small amounts of natural background radiation but to safely handle larger amounts we must keep our distance or as the amounts increase so do the dangers the amount of energy generated by a nuclear explosion is and not here the greater area there is almost total destruction from blast and he is now large amounts it now contains billions of highly radioactive particles that we call fallout the winds of the upper altitude blow on the cloud sending it in one or more directions some of the larger particles may remain suspende atmosphere for days and travel thousands of miles before landing the heaviest particles dropped to the ground within twenty four hours these are the most hazardous because they emit the largest amount of nuclear radiation one hundred miles from the explosion they are about the size of table salt or fine sand within an hour after a massive enemy attack fallout would begin to be a serious problem in the vicinity of any nuclear groundbreakers seven hours later the threatened areas covered more and more of the country as prevailing winds expand the fallout in downwind patterns twenty four hours many people have difficulty understanding how silent invisible rays which cannot even be felt could be so damaging our bodies are made up of millions of cells there the building blocks of our blood and tissues when radiation penetrates the body the cells are injured most of them can repair themselves at the total dose over a period of time is not too high but if  the cells will be destroyed beyond repair we measure radiation in rank and if people received more than two hundred rankin's within a few days many would be sick and some might require medical care three hundred brenton's would cause severe radiation sickness or possibly death and as we go beyond three hundred the danger increases rapidly but we are not without personal weapons of defense one is distance the greater our distance from the fallout particles the less radiation we receive radiation from particles fifty feet away for instance would not affect this as much as from particles a few feet away you would receive less radiation in the middle of a tall building than on the top or bottom floors because there would be more distance and partitions between you and the source of the radiation the fallout particles covering the roof and the ground around the building only an insignificant amount would get inside and along with distance we have the most important defense mass any material with enough we will keep the penetrating rays from hurting us concrete steel and heavy construction materials provide good shielding from fallout radiation and so would two feet of earth and the greater the weight of the material between us and the fallout of the safer we would be taking a house as an example it offers a small amount of mass and distance from radiation but not enough protection in an area of heavy for the fallout shelter is the best defense whether in the basement of a single family home or a large community shelter in say an apartment building barbers the kind of protection from radiation you probably would need in case of nuclear attack twelve noon by one o'clock let's assume all the fallout is done then the total residual radiation would be at the high level by seven o'clock it's down to one ten in two days those still dangerous it's only one one hundred but in two weeks it's only one one thousand so we would not have to take maximum precautions indefinitely we do need food and water to survive but if suttles on your food the food itself isn't harmed or made radioactive since radiation only damages living tissue you simply remove the fallout particles using everyday methods of food preparation feeding wiping for washing swallowed accidentally with food or in drinking water would do even no immediate harm for long term safety it's best to filter the fallout particles are actually the hazard from contaminated food and water is very small compared with that from external gamma radiation and hungry or thirsty people or animals should not be denied food and water because of possible contamination if we remember these that if we act on them intelligently we can increase our chances of surviving nuclear attack and the key to survival is adequate shelter that's why the federal government has a nationwide shelter program the goal is adequate for a lot of shelter space for every man woman and child in this school can be read with knowledge of radiation we can face the take action to protect ourselves against this hazard of the n