Everything2
Near Matches
Ignore Exact
Full Text
Everything2

Why the Aum Shinrikyo and Anthrax don't mix

created by fhayashi

(idea) by fhayashi (5.5 mon) (print)   ?   (I like it!) 1 C! Tue Oct 30 2001 at 0:07:50

A story I heard from someone that works with the CDC who heard it at a bioterrorism workshop.

The Aum Shinrikyo, a wacky Buddhist-cult, was being hassled by a Japanese judge. They decide to kill him. Since it's hard to buy guns in Japan, they decide to kill him with Anthrax.

1. They obtain some Anthrax, which seems to be surprisingly simple for people to get.

2. They buy a high-rise apartment building, upwind of where the judge lives. This is in Tokyo.

3. One fine, sunny day, they release the Anthrax from the high-rise apartment, upwind of the judge's apartment. The Aum Shinrikyo, not being versed in germ warfare, didn't realize that releasing stuff over a city during the day doesn't work, as the heat from the concrete and asphalt heated by the sun gives rise to convection currents. Anthrax spores are lifted up and out of harm's way by the friendly powers of convection.

4. Through the miracle of higher learning and the Internet, the Aum Shinrikyo realize their mistake. They get more Anthrax, and this time, release the spores at night.

5. The Anthrax spores, carried by the breeze, go all over the judge's apartment, as well as through a good chunk of Tokyo. Luckily, the easily-obtained Anthrax was a form used as a vaccine in livestock. A chunk of Tokyo, including the judge, may have been mass-vaccinated against Anthrax, but no one gets sick.

6. At this time, the Aum Shinrikyo decide it's much more fun to use Sarin gas in subways, and succeed in killing innocent people.

It was the guess of the speaker at the conference that if they got the right kind of Anthrax, at least 10,000 people would have died.


printable version
chaos

Spy satellites can't read your license plate I can make you howl. And vice versa. Let's get down to business. Aum Shinrikyo A comprehensive list of Doomsday Cults and other roving groups of fanatical idiots
Falun Gong Did Aum Shinrikyo set off a nuclear bomb in Western Australia in 1993? Anthrax sarin
bioterrorism Religion in Japan Tokyo A Prayer for Mr. Leary
Nichiren Weapons of mass destruction Opus Dei Beauty Overload
Murakami Haruki Everything Japanese Encyclopedia
Y'know, if you log in, you can write something here, or contact authors directly on the site. Create a New User if you don't already have an account.
  Epicenter
Login
Password

password reminder
register

Everything2 Help

Cool Staff Picks
The best nodes of all time:
A Tail of Two Monkeys
Freenet
we lose weeks like buttons, like pencils
Jane's Fighting Nodes
Tampopo
Hong Kong movie subtitles
Ferris wheel
How to pick up women
The Real Foreign Debt
Starship Troopers
Great Lakes
I will be the first thing you will be thinking about after you wake
Galapagos Islands
New Writeups
Nadine_2
The Sound Of Madness(review)
Twin Eclipse
Conversations with God: An Uncommon Dialogue(idea)
SwimmingMonkey
Conversations with Fo Fo- the Loneliest dog in Purgatory(fiction)
locke baron
lynx(thing)
Simulacron3
Reality, Dimensions and the Natural Ontology(essay)
SubSane
Making Love to a 9-Foot Woman(person)
Ouzo
Thoughts(idea)
antigravpussy
I fall silent, listening. The breadcrumbs are talking about us(person)
calgon
Buffalo Bill by the pool(poetry)
gate
Anarchy is Order(idea)
ushdfgakjasgh
Scribeling(thing)
XWiz
Trism(review)
artman2003
Briefcase Full of Souls - Part I(fiction)
Dreamvirus
Alan Ladd(person)
waverider37
Harold Holt(person)
Everything 2 is brought to you by the letter C and The Everything Development Company