Chernobyl killed, at most, 500 people - and that's counting all early deaths from the poorly protected cleanup crew. A mini-Chernobyl would be 1/1000 of this, or one half-dead person.
I can live with those odds.
>> A suitcase full of plastic explosive shaped charges would turn this $3million reactor into a mini-Chernobyl.
> Chernobyl killed, at most, 500 people
...
> A mini-Chernobyl would be 1/1000 of this, or one half-dead person.
Chernobyl was a reactor test gone wrong, which resulted in a large fire spreading most of the core, including tons of uranuium, plutonium, and fission products, into the atmosphere. This contaminated a large area and killed a few people.
This micro-reactor, although it has a power output about 700 times smaller than Chernobyl, contains proportionately more fuel, because it is designed to operate for decades without refueling.
This risk is that Bad Guys(TM) with explosives could breach the core and produce a large “dirty bomb” style contamination event.
Although the amount of radioisotopes released would be perhaps fifty or a hundred times smaller than the amount released at Chernobyl, it would still be a MAJOR release of nasty high level waste. A cleanup could easily cost billions - depending on the location - even if it didn’t kill a single person.
The number is debatable, but almost certainly larger than that, especially if you count the cancer deaths, which are still occurring. And it also rendered an area larger than the state of Connecticutt uninhabitable for the foreseeable future. If you are trying to say that Chernobyl wasn't a big deal, that's ridiculous.