1. Dirty bombs

2. Whole lotta radiation going on

Highly-enriched uranium fuels many civilian reactors. a huge variety of radioactive isotopes are produced by the fission process. Argonne National Laboratory.

Hard to swallow
On May 8, Abdullah Al Mujahir, AKA Jose Padilla, described as a former Chicago street gangster who converted to Islam, was arrested. Now in a Navy brig in South Carolina, he's facing charges for planning to detonate a 'dirty bomb" in an American city, perhaps Washington.

That's the word from Attorney General John Ashcroft, who said Mujahir had been trained by al Qaeda for the purpose.

(Updated Dec. 4, 2006) Padilla, after years of solitary confinement, is no longer charged with trying to make a dirty bomb. Instead, he is to go on trial in Miami for conspiracy to commit terrorism. According to today's New York Times, "The strong public accusations made during his military detention -- about the dirty bomb, Al Qaeda connections and supposed plans to set off natural gas explosions in apartment buildings -- appear nowhere in the indictment against him. The indictment does not allege any specific violent plot against America." (End update).

Since 9/11, we've faced a truckload of new ideas on sowing terror. Jetliners bearing down on office buildings. Anthrax spores in the mail.

Meet the "dirty bomb." Half nuclear weapon, half conventional explosive, this gadget could potentially spread radioactive isotopes far and wide, causing disease and panic.

Although it's radioactive, the dirty bomb does not undergo fission or fusion. Instead, it spreads pollution.

Compared to processing anthrax for distribution in the mail, the recipe for a dirty bomb seems disarmingly simple:

Deadly recipe

Seriously, how do you make a dirty bomb, and how dangerous are they?

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Terry Devitt, editor; Pamela Jackson, project assistant; S.V. Medaris, designer/illustrator; David Tenenbaum, feature writer; Amy Toburen, content development executive

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