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Criticality accident and power deaths

Title: Criticality accident and power deaths
I wrote:

What number of accidental criticalities and deaths would be needed to qualify as "many"?


Related responses
During two of the years I lived in the Northwest, there were four fatal accidents (a total of seven deaths) in chemical facilities handling SO2, and I understand that is approximately the continuing rate of such fatal accidents.  I think  2 fatal accidents a year qualifies as "many."  The rate of process criticality accidents during the years 1955 to 1965, when most of them occurred, qualifies as "many" but the accidents rate dropped dramatically.  I have not looked up any accident statistics for other industries..  
There are about 10 fatal skiing accidents a year in the U. S., and that qualifies as "many." 
 

and

add the 121 workers that were killed during construction of the Snowy
Mountains hydroelectric scheme in Australia.

and
The Good News about Radiation by  John
Lenihan published in 1993 by Medical Physics Publishing (out of print)
From p. 103 of TGNAR by Lenihan DEATHS BETWEEN 1969 AND 1986 RESULTING FROM SEVERE ACCIDENTS TO GENERATE ELECTRIC POWER
Energy Source           no. of severe accidents number of deaths*
coal mining                     62                      3600
oil (refinery fires, transportation)    57              2070
natural gas (fire, explosion)   24                      1440
hydroelectric (dam failures)    8                       3839
nuclear                         1                       31
* immediate deaths only

and

2. Characterizing an average 0.4 accidents per year as "not many" is not justifying them either.  I thought it was an unusually good record of industrial safety, given the state of knowledge in the 1950s and 1960s

I add:
Hoover dam - 96 industrial fatalities during the construction of the dam. Industrial fatalities includes deaths from drowning, blasting, falling rocks or slides, falls from the canyon walls, struck by heavy equipment, truck accidents, etc. Industrial fatalities do not include deaths from the heat, pneumonia, heart trouble, etc. http://www.hooverdam.usbr.gov/History/fatalities/fatal.html

AND

OSHA Preambles
Electrical Power Generation, etc. (29 CFR 1910.269)
V. Regulatory Impact Assessment
A. Introduction
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has determined that there is a significant risk to the health and safety of workers who are exposed to the hazards of electric power generation, transmission, and distribution. . . ..  http://www.osha-slc.gov/Preamble/Elect_data/ELECTRIC5.html


In 1999, there was an inadvertent criticality in Tokaimura Japan. I do not see how much further afield from power production you can get than the bucket of fuel at the plant in Japan. The two deaths from this event PROVED to me that those in charge in Japan learned nothing from the previous inadvertent criticality accidents.  Two sites (of many I found) below seem to support that opinion:
http://www.iaea.org/worldatom/Documents/Tokaimura/iaea-toac.pdf
http://www-rcf.usc.edu/~meshkati/tefall99/toki.html
After reviewing these sites, is there ANYONE on radsafe who could not have predicted this accident would occur? No, it was only a matter of time.


So, what have we learned?

The power industry is a heavily industrialized process. People are killed in industrial accidents - including the production of power - nuclear, hydro, or fossil.

That the industrial safety at locations such as Hoover dam (built in the 1930's) and the Snowy Mountains hydroelectric scheme (1950's?) was not what it is in 2002 (or in 1999).



Now, perhaps there is someone who can tell me how the above "statistics" can be related to the inadvertent criticality and the 2 deaths in Tokaimura Japan (1999)?

How can we compare industrial accidents from the 1930's or other accidents (such as skiing accidents) to a totally avoidable accident in 1999?

To paraphrase Mr. Lipton - Comparative body counts are even less useful.

Perhaps we should stop the comparative body counts and accept that not everyone who needed to learn from the criticality accidents of the past learned enough to prevent them (in the present).

After the Tokaimura accident no one can believe that an average of 0.4 accidents per year is "not many." The accident at Tokaimura clearly showed that there are too many NOW.

Before the vaccine for smallpox, smallpox was a major health concern. Following the development of the vaccine, smallpox was still common. In the early 1950s - 150 years after the introduction of vaccination - an estimated 50 million cases of smallpox occurred in the world each year, a figure which fell to around 10-15 million by 1967. Last natural case, 1977. A fatal laboratory-acquired case occurred in 1978.  Over what period should we take an average? 2000 BC to 1951 AD? 300 AD to 1270 AD? 1900 to 2000? 1980 to 2000? Each gives vastly different "deaths per year" values. However, for any average before 1977, the rate will be above zero. So based on the rates before 1977 a new smallpox case in 2002 could be viewed as "not many?"

What does this prove? You can "prove" just about anything IF you get to use the statistics and rates of your choosing. Do rates of death from skiing or construction of Hoover Dam have any comparison to criticality deaths? Not in my mind.

Paul Lavely
<lavelyp@uclink4.berkeley.edu>
Just an old HP living in a world run by administrative law.



 
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