Peru's Geophysicists Test for Radiation, Meteorite Sickness Caused by Toxic Gases
Andina, Peru's official government news agency reported today that the citizens of Carancas, located in the district of Desaguadero in Puno, Peru, are recovering from the initial sicknesses which were caused by the meteorite which landed in their village Saturday afternoon.

Puno's Regional Health Director, Jorge López Tejada, stated that the peoples health had improved after they were seen by doctors. The cases of nausea, dizziness, migraines and vomiting were controlled by medication that was administered by the health brigades.

"They are recovering, there aren't any critical cases. A total of 200 people with different symptoms have been seen," said López Tejada. In addition, Puno, Peru's Health Director stated that blood samples had been taken from the 15 patients which had been closest to the meteorite.

"The geophysicists have determined that there isn't radiation in the area, the problems people were having have been attributed to toxic subsoil gases which have not been specified yet," stated López Tejada.

The health authority has officially requested that people stay away from the glowing object that fell from the sky. He made this request due to the fact that many curious people have come from all over to observe the crater.

Medical personnel are to stay in Carancas, which is 1,300 km South of Lima, for at least one more week.

Scientist Confirms Meteorite in Puno, Peru is a Chondrite
LIP-ir) -- Peru's official government news agency reported this afternoon that scientists which went to the town of Carancas in the Region of Puno, Peru, have confirmed that the glowing object which fell from the sky on Saturday afternoon was indeed a meteorite.

Volcanologist for Peru's Geological, Mining and Metallurgical Institute (INGEMMET), Luisa Macedo, confirmed that a chondrite meteorite had caused the 17 meter (55 foot) wide and 5 meter (16 foot) deep crater when it landed on earth.

It was reported that with the help of the Desaguadero Municipality, the water would be drained out of the crater to establish the exact size of the hole that was made by the chondrite meteorite.

Macedo explained that the chondrite was not radioactive and did not have any toxic gases or substances which could be harmful to peoples health. On the other hand, Macedo stated that it had not yet been established if the water supply in the province of Chucuito had been contaminated or not.

Aside from the analysis Macedo is performing, the National University of Altiplano, Peru's Nuclear Energy Institute, the National Institute of Natural Resources, the Ministry of Health and a Bolivian university are all taking part in the analysis of the area.

Chondrite
Chondrites are stony meteorites that have not been modified due to melting or differentiation of the parent body. They formed when various types of dust and small grains that were present in the early solar system accreted to form primitive asteroids. Prominent among the components present in chondrites are the enigmatic chondrules, millimeter-sized objects that originated as freely floating, molten or partially molten droplets in space; most chondrules are rich in the silicate minerals olivine and pyroxene. Chondrites also contain refractory inclusions (including Ca-Al Inclusions), which are among the oldest objects to form in the solar system, particles rich in metallic Fe-Ni and sulfides, and isolated grains of silicate minerals. The remainder of chondrites consists of fine-grained (micrometer-sized or smaller) dust, which may either be present as the matrix of the rock or may form rims or mantles around individual chondrules and refractory inclusions. Embedded in this dust are presolar grains, which predate the formation of our solar system and originated elsewhere in the galaxy.

The Clinton Administration is spending billions of dollars to upgrade America's secret spy satellites for the post-Cold War world, replacing systems originally designed to monitor Soviet military targets with satellites more useful in fast-moving regional conflicts, U.S. sources said.

Under one top-secret project, the United States is developing a new, highly flexible series of satellites, code-named 8X, that will provide the CIA and the Pentagon with vastly expanded photographic coverage, making the satellites more adaptable for use by military commanders faced with an array of potential battlefields around the world.

The 8X will be a major upgrade of the KH-12, the current spy satellite workhorse, sources said. The 8X, under development by Lockheed Martin Corp., which builds spy satellites in Sunnyvale, Calif., will be a behemoth, weighing as much as 20 tons, and will be capable of capturing intricately detailed images of areas as large as 1,000 square miles of the Earth's surface.

The isotope, plutonium-238, is not useful for nuclear weapons. However it generates significant heat through its decay process, which make it useful as a long-lived power source. Using a thermocouple, a device that converts heat into electric power, satellites rely on plutonium as a power source. Tiny amounts also provide power to heart pacemakers.

As the launch of Galileo neared, anti-nuclear groups, concerned over what they perceived as an unacceptable risk to the public's safety from Galileo's RTGs, sought a court injunction prohibiting Galileo's launch. RTGs had been used for years in planetary exploration without mishap: the Lincoln Experimental Satellites 8/9, launched by the U.S. Department of Defense, had 7% more plutonium on board than Galileo, and the two Voyager spacecraft each carried 80% as much plutonium as Galileo did. However, activists remembered the messy crash of the Soviet Union's nuclear-powered Cosmos 954 satellite in Canada in 1978, and the 1986 Challenger accident had raised public awareness of the possibility of explosive spacecraft failures. Also, no RTGs had ever been made to swing past the Earth at close range and high speed, as Galileo's Venus-Earth-Earth Gravity Assist trajectory required it to do. This created a novel mission failure modality that might plausibly have entailed total dispersal of Galileo's plutonium in the Earth's atmosphere. Scientist Carl Sagan, for example, a strong supporter of the Galileo mission, said in 1989 that "there is nothing absurd about either side of this argument."

The US is poised to begin production of highly radioactive plutonium 238 - used previously to power spy satellites and space probes - for the first time since the Cold War. Officials say that the plutonium is being produced for "national security".

The isotope, many hundred times more radioactive than plutonium 239 which is used in nuclear arms, is to be produced at the Idaho National Laboratory, a sprawling site close to the Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming. Local environmental and anti-nuclear groups are concerned about possible contamination from radioactive waste: plutonium 238 is so powerful that even a speck of it is enough to cause cancer.

Officials involved in the $1.5bn (£800m) programme, which is intended to produce around 300lb of the material in the next 30 years, say the bulk of the plutonium will be used in secret projects but refuse to provide further details. The material has previously been used in batteries to power deep space probes such as Cassini as well as underwater surveillance and espionage equipment.

"The real reason we're starting production is for national security," Timothy Frazier, head of radio-isotope power systems at the Energy Department, told The New York Times.

English Pravda: American spy satellite downed in Peru as US nuclear attack on Iran thwarted

snippet:

Russian Military Intelligence Analysts are reporting today that one of the United States most secretive spy satellites, the KH-13, targeting Iran was 'destroyed in its orbit' with its main power generator powered by the radioactive isotope Pu-238 surviving re-entry and crashing in a remote region of the South American Nation of Peru, and where hundreds are reported to be ill from radiation poisoning.

Western media reports are stating that the US spy satellite debris hitting Peru was caused by a meteor, but which, according to these reports, would be 'impossible' as the size of 30-meter crater, if caused by a meteorite, would have hit the ground with about as much energy as 1 kiloton tactical nuclear weapon, and which would have been recorded by the seismic stations around the World.