**Breaking*** Document found in Afghanistan confirms airline attack on nuclear power plant

CNN Breaking news ^ | 31 JAN 02 | dcbryan1

[DCBryan1]

More follows

[Jadge]

I'd love it if a US airline banned ALL people of Middle Eastern descent from boarding their airline. I'd fly it. Though it would never happen because of the PC and PR nightmare, they would probably see in increase in ticket purchases. I'd feel more safe. Screw PC, go with probability.

[ignatz_q]

I don't see a lot of people claiming that the energy release would be all that great from a waste pool attack (including BAS). Mostly, the argument is that radioactive material would be spread quite far, with disatrous consequences. It's not analagous to a nuclear weapon, but the analogy to a radiological weapon (popularly called the "dirty nuke") is quite appropriate.

[xm177e2]

Could this have anything to do with those five guys from the video the FBI found?

[TigerTale]

phoney, fantasy-land notions about "equal rights for all"

A couple of folks decended from immigrants--T. Jefferson and J. Madison, might take issue with this characterization...

[Willie Green]

Sounds like Geraldo completed his secret mission for Ted Turner.

[blackdog]

LOL! Yeah, if you know the air freight business, you know the tower and enroute controllers know the crews really well. Most the stuff is hauled at night when things are boring. Chit-chat is a reality.

The funny part is that any pilot knows those stupid idiots cannot even do a readback without assistance from the controllers. They freak at the most basic radio request for expressing an intention.

[GOPJ]

Thank you so much. I wish every concerned person could read your words and feel the comfort I feel now. Again, thank you.

[TigerTale]

I, for one, am not willing to sacrifice the life of myself, my friends, my family, or any of my fellow American citizens on the altar of political correctness

What about the lives and liberty of your fellow American citizens who are naturalized citizens?

[Loopy]

Perhaps it would be very difficult. I don't know, I'm not a terrorist. Maybe watch to many movies. I simply should think it easier to get a pilot on board, take off without clearance and fly for five minutes. Worst case scenario, you crash your plane on takeoff and cause a mess somewhere. I should think a terrorist would view that as a win-win scenario.

[Tennessee_Bob]

Oh you want some too?

Did you save any for me??

Heck, I'm not worried about a nuclear power plant. I live in Oak Ridge, Tennessee.

[Tennessee_Bob]

PING

Hey! Tex has something for us!!!

[Lulu]

I believe it would be much easier to fly something into something in Las Vegas. Or just drop something in that vicinity and or hit something. There are lots of targets that are over there and there are a lot of middle eastern young men there working in restaurants behind the scenes. I know because I was there recently and I saw them.

[gwynapnudd]

"They need a 737 or bigger dont they according to design specs"

Dead wrong on that one!
A small plane loaded to the hilt with high explosives detonated on the surface of the reactor would do nicely.

Dont assume they will use 911 as their modus operandi. And don't assume they dont have Stingers here right now.

[Gamma-131-I]

Semper glad that I don't have a thyroid so I don't need Potassium Iodate. Sort of, anyway. (The damage's done been done.)

[chimera]

I don't see a lot of people claiming that the energy release would be all that great from a waste pool attack (including BAS). Mostly, the argument is that radioactive material would be spread quite far, with disatrous consequences. It's not analagous to a nuclear weapon, but the analogy to a radiological weapon (popularly called the "dirty nuke") is quite appropriate.

There would be some release, but it would not match the hysteria being spread about in the press about this scenario. Do some simple calculations, Assume an average burnup for commercial nuclear fuel. Assume an average decay time. Use the Way-Wigner relationships to estimate total activity. Apply a reasonable diluation factor and dispersion coefficient for external energy delivery. It just doesn't add up.

External energy input simply doesn't drive material around as efficiently as internal (stored) energy release. Here's an example. Compare the dispersion resulting from an exploding firecracker (stored energy release) to an equivalent energy delivered to the same material by a hammer blow. See the difference? Same effect here.

[Common Tator]

Why would the government "leak" it as opposed to just releasing the info

Most likely a CNN reporter asked a DOD news liason person this question. "Bush alluded to attacks on Nuclear power plants in his his State of the Union address? Do you have any proof or should I report that this is just Bush bull sh*t?. The DOD liason person then shows the CNN reporter the poof."

If no one else asked first then CNN gets the story. It is called asking intelligent questions off camera rather than waiting for handouts or doing grandstands at the media news conference.

[Loopy]

You were drunk! Those weren't Middle Eastern Men. Those were employees of that Pyramid Looking Hotel with the Egyptian theme.

[kidd]

This concerns me. It suggests a high level of knowledge about what kind of damage can be done to a nuke plant. Note the part about a large firefighting patrol.

Most people are concerned that a jet crashing into containment would go through to the core. This is unlikely, even for a large jet. Containment buildings are built to withstand a direct hit by a 727. The only dense part of a plane are the engines. The rest of a plane is mostly empty space. On a 727, the engines are closer together, and a direct hit would cause all engines to contact the containment building. On a 747, the engines are so far apart that it is likely that only one engine would make direct contact with containment, which is roughly the equivalent of an entire 727 crashing directly into a containment building.

The greatest concern is fire, thus the concern of the terrorists about firefighting ability. Intense heat may result in a steam line break. In a PWR, this would empty the secondary side of its steam generators, but the core would remain covered (although this in itself is a minor catastrophy). In a BWR, there is a risk of the core becoming uncovered.

BWRs near big cities include: Pilgrim (Boston), Oyster Creek (NJ), and Limerick (Philadelphia).

[Brandon]

Not homeowners, but the Price-Anderson liability pool. Plant operators pay a premium every year to participate in a liability pool managed and administered by private insurers. The Price-Anderson structure was established by the federal government as the model for the structuring of the liability pool, but the operators pay their way on the premiums, and claims are settled by the private underwriters.

At pennies on the dollar. The P-A cap on damage is unrealistically low.

In any case, in this scenario, the insurance companies would probably invoke their "act of war" clauses. They did not use this out on the 9-11 claims, but a number of them made clear that this was a one time exception. In case of another large disaster caused by enemy action, expect the government to have to step in and bail people out.

[Protect the Bill of Rights]

Again, thank you.

I second that sentiment.