Re: Terrorist attacks on nuclear facilities

[SAFarberMSPH@CS.COM]

In a message dated 9/12/01 6:18:35 AM Pacific Daylight Time, 

jearley@enercon.com writes:



> Subj:Re: Terrorist attacks on nuclear facilities
>
> Date:9/12/01 6:18:35 AM Pacific Daylight Time
>
> From:    jearley@enercon.com (Jack Earley)
>
> Sender:    owner-radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu
>
> Reply-to: jearley@enercon.com (Jack Earley)
>
> To:    keith.millington@TFT.CSIRO.AU, radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu
>
>
>
>
>
> As I recall, since TMI is near the Harrisburg International Airport, its
>
> containment was designed to withstand the impact of a 737 at 600 mph. I
>
> suppose any future plants should now take that design feature into account.
>
>
> Jack Earley
>
> Radiological Engineer


Radsafe:


My recollection is the Seabrook containment was designed to survive a direct 

impact from a military jet [from Pease Air Force base nearby at the time] 

fully loaded with armament. At the time I was involved with licensing work on 

Seabrook as staff meteorologist for Yankee Atomic, and Seabrook ended up with 

double containments. There is an outer shell with a concentric inner shell 

with a few foot air gap between both shells.


A commercial airliner has very few massive single components with the engines 

and their turbines being most likely the most substantial components capable 

of damaging structures.


 I have no expertise in this area but my intuitive feeling is that were a 

commercial airliner crashed into a nuclear containment by terrorists, it  

would be unlikely to be able to breach the containment buildings of the 

average nuclear plant. Input from engineers with expertise on this matter is 

essential.   I have seen films of testing done on contaminants where 

telephone poles are fired on end  from cannons, slamming into  reinforced 

concrete walls at over 300 mph to simulate a tornado driving a pole into a 

nuclear containment. As I understand it a telephone pole at potential tornado 

driven speeds slamming on end into the containment wall as a battering ram 

was considered a maximum test.    The average plane crash into wooded areas 

or the ground results in a plane breaking up into very small pieces. A plane 

crash into a reinforced concrete shell would likely result in the complete 

disintegration of the plane and even the engines hitting the containment 

don't seem to have the potential damage potential of a telephone pole on end. 

I'm sure this issue will be the subject of many engineering analyses over the 

near term. 


It's also my feeling that the terrorist groups who planned yesterday's awful 

deeds had evaluated the impact of crashing a commercial jet into a nuclear 

power plant and concluded it would not produce enough real damage and impact 

for their efforts to justify the effort. A plane crash into a nuclear power 

plant containment would have likely made a mess on-site from the impact and 

fire,  but no serious radiological accident. Any input from knowledgeable 

technical specialists?


Stewart Farber, MS Public Health

Public Health Sciences

email: SAFarberMSPH@cs.com


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