Quote:
Katherine Derbyshire wrote:
As a side note, this whole conversation has been tossing terms like "explosion" around with wild abandon, and I think at least some of the confusion may result because different people are using them in different ways.
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Look at the the title of the thread, Katherine. This conversation comes from an ealier thread on nuclear accidents in which I said that a nuclear plant can explode. Someone told me "The fact that you believe that a nuclear plant can explode shows just how little you understand about the subject."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_N-wNFSGyQ
THAT is what I meant by saying a nuclear plant can explode. And it seems that that explosion produced just what I feared it would: a cracked containment vessel.
I made clear in the first thread as well as in this thread that I didn't mean that a nuclear plant would blow up like a nuclear bomb. What about the explosion at Fukushima do you fail to understand as an explosion? Strings of technical jargon cannot obfuscate the fact that Fukushima Dai Ichi exploded. There's no way you can explain that away.
Quote:
Katherine Derbyshire wrote:
I suppose that a fuel tank explosion would technically meet David's claim that a "nuclear plant can blow up," but I think we all know that wasn't what he had in mind.
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No, what i had in mind was some kind of explosion, either inside or outside the reactor containment vessel that could cause the core to be exposed. And I was told that that could not happen. But, again, it apparently has. In any case, even if it didn't breech the reactor vessel, they were storing nuclear material
on the roof of the plant and that pretty certainly melted down and released nuclear material into the environment. And mark my word, the release is
far worse than the for-profit corporation responsible has admitted.
Quote:
Katherine Derbyshire wrote:
The scary stuff starts to happen if the rapid release of energy takes place *inside* the reactor vessel.
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Er....unless the nuclear material is stored
on the roof of the building that explodes....Or... if the explosion breeches the containment of the core, which then melts down, which also apparently happened at Fukushima.
Quote:
Katherine Derbyshire wrote:
That's what happened at Chernobyl, and that's what shot highly radioactive material all over the place. But there is no evidence that such a situation has occurred -- or could occur -- at Fukushima.
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But you can't deny that Fukushima did explode and released plutonium and cesium 137. And the containment vessel was likely ruptured and the core has likely been exposed and has at least partially melted down. If that's not "scary" to you, then I will buy you a ticket to go there and live inisde the "exclusion zone." You'll have your pick of the nicest houses to live in and you can retire on the wonderful book you can write while you live your quiet and peaceful life in perfect safety.