RE: Fire breaks out on nuclear ship

["Ted Rockwell" <tedrock@CPCUG.ORG>]

> "If this fire had taken place with a plutonium or nuclear waste cargo the

consequences could have been catastrophic."



John:



This is a typical news story which is not news unless you bring in the word

nuclear.  But it was not a "nuclear ship" in any rational use of the term.

Is a ship that once carried diamonds a "diamond ship"?  The story is just

another vehicle by which Greenpeace can cynically repeat its mantra

associating "nuclear" and "plutonium" with disaster.  Just keep repeating

it, and it becomes not only truth but a deep-seated fear.



It's like publicizing every story involving an Italian criminal and

reminding people that it's Italians who run the mafia.  We've handled Pu in

tonnage lots for nearly two human generations without a single death

attributable to Pu.  You can't say that about many materials!



Even with a full load of plutonium (whatever that is) and a full-scale fire,

there would have been no medically-significant public hazard.  Greenpeace et

al might be able to whip up some baseless panic.  But if putting 5 to 7 TONS

of plutonium into the air though weapons tests could create no single case

of Pu-related illness, then a few grams wouldn't do it.



Sorry!



Ted





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