When did they find the time? (fallout 3)

[Subuki]

Elder Lyons specifically states that they're watching out for the locals, which his superiors back on the West Coast have shunned him for. D.C BoS act more like Paladins of justice than a military sect.

And D.C was not utterly destroyed, many people were still alive after the initial blast, there were plenty of audio logs (that I have found so far... They're spread around in some crazy places) that shows this... Most notably the girl watched her dad disintegrate infront of her only leaving his shadow... Or the other girl who was running to get inside a vault, but was denied entrance... Or there was even a Vault-Tec mail in someone's mailbox that denied whoever lived in that house a spot in a vault(even going so far as to retain the fee they paid to get them on a "waiting list")

So there were plenty of opportunities after the bombs drop to try and maintain order.

 

[M-26-7]

That's why there are signs.

...At spots that are nuclear hotspots 200 years later?

Radiation persists. It's not a far fetched assumption that current hotspots were there 200 years ago, only far deadlier (think The Glow).

How many "emergency services" do you think are available after nuclear obliteration? You come in and tell someone to shut up and then speak as if you're an authority when really all you have to say is more BS...

Note that DC was not obliterated, merely bombed to hell and back. Since it is largely intact (though that's a very broad term), it's not impossible that emergency and civil services continued their operation according to emergency procedures for some time, until everything fell apart with time and morale loss.

If you're going to take a some-what realistic approach to this then you have to factor in that nothing would be left of DC. Nothing. Imagine the glow times 10000. Even if some or even all bombers were shot down the thing would be blown to hell and back. Besides New York, there is nothing besides DC that comes close to DC as far as being a high priority target.

 

[Tagaziel]

But it survived the War, and that's a fact. Therefore, having survived, emergency and civil services would continue to operate.

Is it really that hard to swallow? People don't turn into wastelanders and raiders the instant bombs hit.