Re: Airplane crash

[Keith Welch <welch@CEBAF.GOV>]

At 01:33 PM 2/25/97 -0600, you wrote:
>To add to Frank's Comment,

>If this story is true, the specific event would have been highly
>classified...and it would NOT have been a Nautilus type PWR!
>
>S.,
>
>MikeG.

Mike,

I recall part of the nuc powered plane project involving flying with a sub
reactor in the plane - but not as the propulsion unit.  The tests were done
to evaluate a shielding package for the plane.  They put the reactor in the
area of the plane where the eventual power plant would go, then brought it
up to power.  And for some reason deemed it necessary to fly around with it
that way.  The report I saw was in the context of "nuclear plane spews
radiation over the countryside while pilots take joy ride" or something like
that.  After the tests were de-classified, the residents who found out that
it flew near their homes were up in arms.  Some (no-doubt induced by
attorneys) claimed to have been injured.  Some pseudo-expert claimed that
the plane was jettisoning radioactivity or that somehow the direct radiation
from the plant could have injured someone on the ground.  They also hyped
the possibility that the ground crews prepping the plane were highly
exposed.  You know, the typical stuff.  Sounded like they were all going to
grow three heads.




Keith Welch
Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility
Newport News VA
welch@cebaf.gov