HOMELAND PROTECTION INC. Experts say radiation detectors are useless

If you hear a radiation detector alarm go off, it's too late, an expert said.
NEW YORK (AP) -- A California company has sold hundreds of $149 home radiation detectors since it began advertising them on cable TV channels last week, its co-owner says, but experts say the devices would be of little use in a true nuclear emergency.
The nine-employee company's Web site warns of the possibility of gamma radiation from so-called "dirty" radiological bombs, as well as "nuclear spills or meltdowns, terrorist attack on nuclear power plants, accidents or sabotage.
"With the recent increase in terrorism you and your family are at more risk than ever," the Web site states. "The nuclear power plant near you may be the next TERRORIST TARGET!"
The site juxtaposes photos of a nuclear explosion's mushroom cloud, cooling towers of a nuclear plant and the flaming twin towers of the World Trade Center -- felled by jetliners, not a nuclear explosion.
"We want to give awareness to people that crazy things happen," said Jack Khorsandi, the chief financial officer and co-owner of Homeland Protection Inc., the West Hollywood, Calif.-based company selling the devices.
"The chance that people have a suitcase bomb, it's there," said Khorsandi, who said his company had sold hundreds of the detectors since the ads began running last week on channels with heavy news content including CNN. "There's never been the thought that such a crazy thing could happen to our country. It's a kind of wake-up call."
Experts' views
At the federal Office of Homeland Security, spokesman Gordon Johndroe noted that environmental monitoring for radiation already takes place near the country's nuclear power plants, as well as at U.S. ports of entry.
In a true nuclear emergency, anyone within earshot of the detector's alarm would already be afflicted by radiation, said Jon Wolfsthal, an associate with the nonproliferation project at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
"If anything, it sounds like a way to exploit the fears of the American public as opposed to protecting them," he said. "I wouldn't plunk down $149 of my own money on one of these things."