6 hours ago, TheVat said:

a clean wipe of all animal species (cockroaches excepted) from the planet.

This is a myth that MythBusters busted. They found that flour beetles and fruit flies can withstand higher amounts of cobalt-60 radiation than cockroaches, with the flour beetles able to survive the most lethal dose of radiation that was used.

 

Edited December 19, 20241 yr by KJW

Good for them.  My reply was addressing a different point in another thread, and the cockroach reference was a use of synecdoche.  Faster than typing "and several other hardy insect species."  Cheers.