I got into the nuke business in the Year of Orwell, at Brown’s Ferry.
As a science geek in my early twenties, I learned a lot more than was necessary for the job. One thing I did was study the FSAR (Final Safety Analysis Report), to see if I could destroy the place in some unforeseen way.
Because the spent fuel pool floor actually had openings to the outside, I’m still not certain that a worst-case tornado couldn’t stir those pools up a bit. Obviously the odds would be astronomical. I doubt a tornado could rip that roof off, so it’d have to kind of bend sideways getting in. Then the worst (imaginary) case is spent fuel getting yanked out and flung around the county like a cow.
Apparently the big brains aren’t worried about that happening. I’m not losing any sleep either.
Earthquakes were certainly addressed. But seismically, Alabama is no Japan. It’s pretty far from the New Madrid line. A 9.5 earthquake can do whatever it wants, but earthquake zones are pretty well-mapped. Japan’s problem is that it is one.
Volcano? They do occasionally pop up, and not necessarily in seismically active regions. Did the FSAR account for volcanos like it did earthquakes? Maybe, but I don’t remember it.
The FSAR didn’t address meteorites. For shame! What, a sufficient large hunk of metal travelling at seven miles a second couldn’t cause a problem? This one could probably cause a meltdown.
This one definitely could.
Finally, I bet you could melt a nuke down by nuking it with a megaton-scale bomb. Nuke the nukes, man! Didn’t see that in the FSAR. Maybe I just missed it. But if you’re going to call your paper the Final Safety Analysis Report, you gots to be paranoid, boss.
Forget “safety experts”…call in an experienced D&D team with a sadistic DM.
Oh, and for the record…I totally found a way to take over Arkansas Nuclear One with a Diehard-sized assault team.
A clue as to your age!
You’re so older than me, dude.
As Indy said,
“It’s not the years, honey…it’s the milage.”
Which probably makes me way way older.
ha ha, most excellent quote.
I have this (assuming typical) tendency to mentally picture bloggers whom I read regularly, and if I don’t have the basics then my imagination fills in the blanks, usually way off course. I have assumed males to be female twice already. (Zombie drives me crazy for this reason; I have no hope of envisioning him/her/it without knowing the sex.)
I had you pegged at my age, but it’s not a drastic adjustment. Better than a mental sex change!
Probably because of both nature and environment, I don’t really mentally picture images. Almost everything is dedicated to information, ideas, and processes.
You probably won’t believe this, but on a few occasions I’ve read my dream. That is, I’m dreaming, but the dream is of reading text, which is describing a fantastical dream.