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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group

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To: stockman_scott who wrote (6427)	10/20/2001 9:25:41 AM
From: Sully-	Read Replies (2) of 281500

Scott, I saw an expert on our nuclear facilities who debunked the theory that a fully loaded jumbo jet could cause a nuclear catastrophe. The walls of our reactors are like seven feet thick reinforced concrete. They showed a film of a jet (F-16??) ramming an equivalently structured piece of concrete. The jet was fully loaded & flying at full throttle. There was no more than 2 or 3 inches of concrete destroyed at the deepest point of impact. The expert said that a fully loaded jumbo jet scoring a direct hit at full throttle might do twice, maybe 3 times the damage that the fighter jet did.......... leaving more than 6 feet of undamaged wall. Additionally, he discussed the problems of having a large airliner being able to score a direct hit at full speed on a reactor due to it's shape, plus it is much lower height than any skyscraper. Chances are it would receive a glancing blow which would direct most of the energy away from the reactor wall. He discussed the danger of them hitting the waste water too. I don't recall the specifics, but he said that it was possible to cause a problem, but it would not be a China Syndrome like release..... but it could cause some serious albeit quite localized problems. He offered a solution to completely eliminate this problems as well. The expert said that there was a greater chance of a determined group of terrorists (that would absolutely need a few nuclear reactor experts among the zealots) that could take over a facility & cause a meltdown from within. He noted that we needed to improve our security at all sites to eliminate the (slim IMO) chance of a successful attack on our nuclear facilities. You feel it is important to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. Shutting down our nuclear reactors will only increase our dependence for many years to come. I say we identify all potential weaknesses with them & take appropriate steps to make them secure while we find a way to eliminate our dependence on outside sources of energy. We are finding more & more every day that hype, ratings & the desire to draw attention to oneself are feeding our fears & causing overreactions to any number of weaknesses......... real & imagined.

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