If Sellafield blows, what will you do?

BuffyBot

Go "Oops, that's not good" and then hope the wind is blowing from the West

Cabaal

Well I'm going to fall back on my safety training and I'm simple going to "duck & cover" it was good enough defense in the 50/60's its good enough defense today!

Bloody young people today...

daveg

Forget about travelling to the West of Ireland.... or for the matter the other side of Europe.

"If a plane crashed into ... Sellafield, it has been calculated that it would release 44 times as much radioactivity as the Chernobyl disaster, and could cause more than 2m cancers"

We don't just have Sellafield to worry about. Dont forget Cap de la Hague in Normandy France which also viewed as a possible Terrorits target.

Some interesting exerts from this interesting and scary article:

"Some years ago, General Buis declared that even before a shot was fired, a country with a civil nuclear power programme such as France would be impossible to defend. And, in 1991, General Etienne Copel wrote about the grave dangers of suicidal pilots or indeed of missiles being targeted against nuclear reactors. Those military minds were in no doubt that a civil nuclear power programme on the scale now existing in France had unquestionably created unsurpassed vulnerability in a world of suicidal terrorism"

"The idea of targeting a nuclear installation with a civil airliner is not new. In November 1972, hijackers in the US took over a plane with 27 passengers and 4 crew. The hijackers were armed with guns and a hand grenade and they demanded a $10 million ransom or they would cause the plane to crash on a nuclear reactor at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. They forced the pilot to make a steep dive towards the reactor, only letting him pull out when the airline agreed to the hijackers' demands"

"Four days after the terrorist attack against the World Trade Centre in 1993, the New York Times received a letter in which the Islamic Jihad group threatened an impending attack against nuclear installations. The group had trained the previous November just 15km from the Three Mile Island nuclear power station. Despite the UK Nuclear Forum's assurances, nuclear power stations and their support structures make for obvious civilian targets when the aim is terrorism on a massive scale"

"In recent years, some 140 arrests have been made, the latest in August when four people were arrested with 2kg of uranium-235 in their possession, almost enough for a nuclear bomb. And in Europe, between 1992 and 1998, 173 attempted thefts were reported, some involving potential bomb-making material. Meanwhile, the Italian mafia is now actively involved in the illicit transport of nuclear waste from Eastern Europe, and in 1997 was known to have imported more than 100 truckloads of radioactive scrap metal into the Province of Brescia alone. There, the risk is that the radioactive material is added to recycled metal, so dispersing radioactive material far and wide"

hedgetrimmer

With the radiation I would mutate and become radioactive DUDE.

Still, though, if it happened, I don't think I'd have much time to escape, so would probably phone the people I love and say goodbye

swiss

Thinking back on old physics classes (and I could of course be wrong) I don't think that flying a plane into a nuclear power plant necessarily has a very good chance of initiating a thermonuclear reaction.

Firstly, Sellafield is responsible for nuclear waste reprocessing. It does not handle weapons grade plutonium, instead dealing with spent plutonium fuel and converting it into MOX - or a mixed oxide plutonium. According to this source, the critical mass (i.e the mass of mixed oxide plutonium that is required for a chain reaction to take place) is 35 kilograms. Although an explosion at such a nuclear plant as sellafield might devastate the plant itself, if the nuclear material is properly housed and isolated, there should be no reason why the plutonium will acheive critical mass under any circumstance.

The iodine tablets are of course a joke. They only provide a modicum of protection against one particular type of cancer (IIRC) of the thyroid. Again, a quick search through google threw up this.

Its tendency to collect in the thyroid gland makes iodine especially useful for diagnosing and treating thyroid problems. Iodine-123 is widely used in medical imaging, and I-124 is useful in immunotherapy.

Iodine appears to have few other preventative properties, seriously solice, I wouldn't worry about not getting one. In fact were the unthinkable to happen, I'm pretty sure that the last thing on my mind would be getting to that iodine tablet. I'd try to estimate the fallout first, and (assuming I'm not instantly vaporised) try to make it to a minimum 'safe' distance. Probably the western coast.

the Guru

Pee my pants

Paddy20

Listen to my favourite CD, while waiting for the inevitable to happen. Without any fear of passing away from this valley of tears.

P.

cournioni

Get laid.

Sleipnir

As long as the government are saved, It'll all be O.K.:rolleyes:

zAbbo

..try and beat that end game boss of donkey kong before i melt loike

Panda

put my head between my legs and kiss my ass goodbye.....

woosaysdan

i'll be on holidays that day!!!

K2

get laid repeatedly, then make up the spare room. I live on the west coats so will be expecting a few visitors!:D

Typedef

There has been a study conducted into this very scenario.

http://www.wise-paris.org/english/ourbriefings_pdf/011029AircraftCrashSellafield3.pdf

Even though a core melt down would be difficult to achieve there is a particular building in Sellafield (building B215) which if it was hit by (say a boeing 767) could potentially release enough radioactive material to have quote

"several dozen times the global and long term impact of the Chernobyl accident"

Or in other words, most of the UK, Ireland and parts of Western Europe would be rendered uninhabitable (due to high levels of radioactivity) for tens of generations and many, many people in the path of the released radioactive material would simply die from radiation poisoning.

Such an act, would probably be the single biggest mass murder in the history of the human species.

Interesting.

tba

they should have given us cyanide tablets not iodine

WhiteWashMan

hmm, i seriously doubt that crashing a plane into sellafield would have the immediate explosion that people are worried about.
for a start nuclear fission is only caused by shooting particles of uranium into iostopic nuclear material (ok, this is a simple version, ive forgotten most of my university physics. its not like i actually got my physics degree alright! )
i cant imagine that sellafield as a refining factory (do they even create energy there anymore? i dont think so) would not have either of these two materials near each other, let alone close enough for one material to react to the other.
its actually quiet hard to create a nuclear reaction like a bomb.
i would also hope that all the radio active material is kept below ground. god do i hope

on the other hand, if something like that did happen, i suspect there would be some serious contamination along the lines of a smaller chernobyl (that was producing energy i think, because if i recall the core metled. serious problem!)
a good film to watch is when the wind blows by raymond briggs (of the snowman fame). actually, its a bit bloody depressing.

either way, id be straight down to the euro star on my way to spain with shinji in my boot and many crates of larger.

The Sweeper

I'd steal the nearest small motorbike I could find and drive (can't drive a car) to the euro tunnel, then get to france, then travel around following the sound of singing and pedantic opinionated bollocks talking and I'd find the pedantic opinionated bollocks talkers and I'd beat the sh1t out of them and say...

"...you think it's funny to put that poofter in the boot, steal my lager and LEAVE ME BEHIND DO YOU???"

WhiteWashMan

Originally posted by Minesajackdaniels
I'd steal the nearest small motorbike I could find and drive (can't drive a car) to the euro tunnel, then get to france, then travel around following the sound of singing and pedantic opinionated bollocks talking and I'd find the pedantic opinionated bollocks talkers and I'd beat the sh1t out of them and say...

"...you think it's funny to put that poofter in the boot, steal my lager and LEAVE ME BEHIND DO YOU???"

do we know you?

The Sweeper

...I'm the one who's loosened the wheel nuts on your car.

WhiteWashMan

can someone please remove this person?

bloggs

I would ran and stand behind Mary Harney, she would block the radiation

Stark

I'll swallow my iodine tablet, it will stop radiation from building up in my cells as they're scattered throughout dublin.

weemcd

id loose my virginity, but knowing my luck someone would find it and return it!

andrew163

id find a beautiful desperate virgin, a bed and go at it for several hours until we both melt into each other from the radiation or something.....

Typedef

I think I'd be in the quick merciful death camp myself.

Something spectacular..... say bungee jumping off the SIPTU building.... with no bungee cord (or similar).

andrew163

Originally posted by bloggs
I would ran and stand behind Mary Harney, she would block the radiation

lmao

Havelock

WWM is quite right, there is no chance of causing a nuclear explosion by crasing into Sellafield, but the long term radation poisioning would be the biggest cluster**** ever. Lets just hope the wind is blowing east-south-east on the day.
If we had a national emergency channel set up, and evacuation proceedures along the east coast, we would mimamise causaltises. To be honest your best be is to emmigrate to, oh lets say 1 mlie below Offaly. And live there for about 200 years, while the radiation disapates.

Lemming

Originally posted by Havelock
To be honest your best be is to emmigrate to, oh lets say 1 mlie below Offaly. And live there for about 200 years, while the radiation disapates.

As I said earlier;

"In any case, we're boned"

Dooom

aside from my earlier post, i might also: shout "watch out, Radioactive man!" and then laugh and sit in a deck chair and smoke a bunch of cigarettes...heh heh heh

The Muppet

After taking my iodine tablet I would Admire the biggest firework display in history. Then i,ll have me tea.