not to be pessimistic or anything of that nature, but after i read this article, i began to wonder...just what are the ramifications of terrorists bombing a nuclear power facility?.

are we talking meltdown here? i know that there are some on this forum that will say, "it could never happen...we are prepared with anti-terrorist hardware, and it is all y2k compliant, uhhh...i mean ready."

anyway, here is the article from reuters:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) An American nuclear power plant recently was the target of a terrorist threat according to a letter from the head of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that was made public by a Democratic lawmaker Friday. http://www.abcnews.go.com/wire/US/Reuters19990521_2062.html

-- Anonymous, May 21, 1999

Answers

At the time of the Three Mile Island Incident I was briefed that each faciity was designed to withstand the impact of a 747. Beyond that I was led to believe all bets are off.

-- Anonymous, May 22, 1999

snowleopard6,

I would agree with that last. When you're talking about terror-based incidents, sabotage naturally comes to mind rather quickly. For that, you surely don't need a 747. The terr community has some very sharp people in it, and it wouldn't surprise me to learn that they already know how to cause much trouble with nothing more than some basic hand tools that you can buy anywhere.

-- Anonymous, May 22, 1999

LP,

Concur. The era in which most of our nuclear facilities were designed was about the time the first Airport movie was filmed. Terrorists to us back then was more in the way of hijackers, seeking either freedom or ransom. Our facility design parameters were not designed to withstand the current bag of tricks available to most terrorist groups, today. Few buildings or critical sites in this country are "hardened" to withstand a real "assualt" of any kind let alone just a disgruntled employee. Many feathers were ruffled years ago by one of our special operations units whose purpose was to simulate such attacks on our own sites to identify vulnerabilities. Bottom line, penetration is possible virtually everywhere.

My biggest concern is a "runaway" plant, such as was experienced in Chernobyl, but in a serious Y2K environment where the communications, resources, heroic pilots and aircraft dropping sand, were unavailable. How long would such a site spew radiation into the atmosphere? Could it be bombed out, with a low yield nuclear weapon? I'm not so sure! Having been too close to TMI, in 1979. I'm not convinced we are any better able to deal with such a situation today than we were then.

-- Anonymous, May 22, 1999

I don't know about risk of terrorist attacks against nuclear or chemical processing plants, but up here in the Great White North the gvt has already talked about having soldiers guarding the nuclear plants (Ontario?) because there is a risk that if power goes out the unprepared populace (will be reported as terrorists?) may feel obliged to attack them to show their displeasure with being left in the cold in the famously bitter canadian winter. Given what happened at TMI, we don't necessarily need terrorists or angry masses, sloppy remediation and falling dominos is higher up on the list of threats to nukes.

-- Anonymous, May 23, 1999