Team Inspects suspected plutonium site (update by the journalist who broke original story, NEW info)

Pittsburgh Tribune Review ^ | April 11, 2003 | Carl Prine

[FairOpinion]

SOUTH OF BAGHDAD: A scout team from the Pentagon's Defense Threat Reduction Agency arrived in a convoy Thursday at the Al-Tuwaitha nuclear complex, beginning a probe that could take weeks to determine whether plutonium is present at the massive nuclear facility and extensive underground complex.

[AnAmericanMother]

IAEA investigators said they would be "surprised, but not necessarily shocked"

"I'm shocked, shocked to find that plutonium is being stored here."

[EternalVigilance]

Good one!

[spokeshave]

Mmmm.........Yellowcake!

Homer Simpson

[Lady In Blue]

The Pentagon team also began interviewing a former nuclear physicist and an engineer who recently worked at Al-Tuwaitha. The two men told the Marines they would show coalition investigators "everything we didn't show the inspectors" from the IAEA.

[FairOpinion]

ping

Follow to the original article which broke the story, that you posted first on FR ( before the rest of the media started to cover it)

[Wissa]

"See, the beakers are still setting there. There are cultures growing in them. I sure don't want to go in and see what's in them. Leave that to the Army."

That reminds me. I have dishes to wash.

[Lael]

The main difference between weapons-grade plutonium and reactor-grade plutonium is the percentage of different isotopes, according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Weapons-grade contains more of the isotope plutonium-239 than reactor-grade plutonium.

Yes!!!

When you are making Weapons grade Plutonium, you 'cook' the fuel rods for a relatively SHORT period of time, Maximumizing PU-239, and minimizing PU-240.

Power Reactors are left on line longer to get electricity, increasing PU-240.

The whole key to fissionable material is that it have an ODD atomic weight...thus U-235, U-233 [made by cooking Thorium in a Reactor], and PU-239 can be set off by ANY stray neutrons at all!

If you try to use Reactor Grade Plutonium, you must separate PU-239 from PU-240...Much more difficult than separating U-235 from U-238.

I'm betting it is Weapons Grade Plutonium!

[ez]

The Combat Engineers said looters or Iraqi officials broke seals placed on uranium stores at the Yellowcake site by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Broke seals at 14 different buildings? Broke seals at the site of huge underground caverns of "heavy water?" I don't think so.

We were told that Saddam was missing one thing from being able to create a nuke...fissionable material. It does not inspire confidence to learn that that the UN "sealed" radioactive nuclear material right in Iraq and knew about it all along.

[ISawIt]

Is it just me?

Or was Sgt. Turner of the Marines being droll?

"See, the beakers are still setting there. There are cultures growing in them. I sure don't want to go in and see what's in them. Leave that to the Army."

Either way, I got a chuckle or three.

[AnAmericanMother]

OoooooWeeeeee. My hubby was in the Chemical Corps when he was on active. This would be his little red wagon.

In the interest of our children not being born gently glowing green, I'm glad it isn't his now . . . :-D

But the Gyrene's comment IS funny.

Seriously, the NBC guys will know what to do. This is what they train for.

[MightyMouseToSaveThe Day]

Apparently the UN thought that placing a seal was enough and are irritated that the Marines disregarded the seal (which i find hard to believe). But notice a few sentences down from that in the original article where it says that looters and/or Iraqi officials broke other seals! I guess they didn't know either the seals were supposed to thwart diversion to the wrong hands. haha

[Diddley]

Makes you wonder what documents the Iraqi embassy in Brazil was shredding the other day.

Bingo!

[justshutupandtakeit]

It should be remembered that "weapons" grade material is not necessary. For a dirty bomb I'll bet you that this material would be highly effective.

That was always the real fear that terrorists would use "dirty bombs" despite the mythology of nuclear devices in the hands of terrorists.

Saddam's danger has been clearly revealed, the use of terrorists recruited from all over the Middle East. These killers are the last gasp there now but have been there for years and shuffled in and out of the terrorist camps there and in Syria, Iran, Lebanon,Yemen, and probably N.Koran. :^)

[browardchad]

From IAEA.org:

11, Friday: IAEA Concerned About Security of Nuclear Material in Iraq. US authorities have assured the IAEA that stored nuclear material at Iraq's Al Tuwaitha site is properly protected and secured. The assurances came in response to a letter from IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei in which he underlined the need to ensure the security, safety, and protection against proliferation of all the nuclear material there, which has been under IAEA seal since 1991. The Al Tuwaitha research center has been a focal point of IAEA weapons inspections in Iraq under Security Council mandate.

You really have to laugh -- "seals" were supposed to keep this material safe in Iraq? And if the seals were broken, or material was missing, what would the IAEA do? Stamp their feet and ask for more time?

The other day, ElBaradei was insisting that the IAEA had to inspect any nuclear material found in Iraq -- I guess the high radiation levels (not to mention flying bullets and the absence of his pal Saddam's protection) have made him change his tune.

[FairOpinion]

We only have the word of an official who commented on the condition of anonymity that the seals were broken, who wasn't there, he just surmised it, trying to dismiss the find, then as people picked up this anononymous comment, it was getting amplified.

Funny some people place more credibility in the comment of an unnamed person, than the marines and experts who ARE there.

I think some people ( French?? are really sweating and all the Saddam appeasers are trying to shove this under the rug.

[Beck_isright]

Now you've done it. You've made Hansie boy look like a bigger fool. No visa to Sweden for you!!!!

V

[Beck_isright]

I got a chuckle too. Leave it to the Army to clean up. We just kick butt and go home asap. We're not MP's:)

V

[Beck_isright]

I'm sure that W is going to have a full blown WW IV scenario to deal with now. Once the secret is out that Brazil was cooperating with Cuba, who was working with Libya, to help Venezuela, buy the bomb from Iraq, Pakistan and North Korea to sell back to Syria, Nigeria and God knows who else; damn, lost my train of thought and got confused on just how big this Axis of Evil really is. This is a world war. Pray that we find the nukes before one of our cities goes up people. That show "24" may not be such fiction after all.

V

[Beck_isright]

There are a lot of rumors that there is a dirty bomb on our soil already. Let's hope that they are just that.

V

[cookcounty]

"The newest disgusting story for me was the one I heard live today - an Iraqi talking about his eight year old daughter who was put in prison and released when she was fifteen. I missed just exactly what it was she was put in prison for - if anyone else got it, let me know."

Don't know specificaly, but there was an earlier story of 100+ kids who were "political prisoners" because they wouldn't (or ther parents wouldn't allow them to) join "Saddam's Youth." (as in Hitler Youth).