RE: 60th criticality accident

["Minnema, Douglas" <Douglas.Minnema@ns.doe.gov>]

Technically, you should also add some reactor accidents.  SL-1 and Chernobyl
were criticality accidents, along with one in Brazil in 1980, TMI was not.
Also, there have been somewhere on the order of 14 criticality accidents in
the Former Soviet Union, including two very recent ones (1 in 1997, 1 in
1998).  Fatalities acknowledged from these accidents include 3 at SL-1,
30(?) at Chernobyl, 1 in Brazil, and 1 in the 1998 FSU accident.  The FSU
has also reported at least 5 fatalities, 1 blinding, and 1 amputation of
both legs from the other events (not including the 1998 event).

According to my records, not including yesterday's event, we have:

	8   non-reactor process accidents;
	33 reactor and critical experiments accidents;

	which breaks down to:

		5   fissile solution systems;
		11 bare and reflected metal systems;
		11 moderated metal and oxide systems;
		6  miscellaneous systems.

Total number of fatalities, including the 30 from Chernobyl, totals to 44.

Can't explain the 60 number.  Perhaps "they" have a different definition of
criticality accident than we do.

One good reference (of several available) would be "Nuclear Criticality
Safety:  Theory and Practice", Ronald Allen Knief, 5th printing, 1996,
American Nuclear Society.

Doug Minnema, Ph.D., CHP
<Douglas.Minnema@ns.doe.gov>

what few thoughts i have are truly my own

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Karam, Andrew [SMTP:Andrew_Karam@URMC.Rochester.edu]
> 
	...  Can anyone verify or falsify this number or
> lead me to an appropriate list?
> --------------------------------
> 
> According to a criticality safety course handout I received at a DOE
> training course in 1993 there have been 10 recorded criticality accidents,
> all but one in the US (the other was at Windscale in 1958).  These are:
> 
> Los Alamos		8/8/45	1 death, one other exposed
> Los Alamos		5/21/46	1 death, two others exposed
> Oak Ridge Y-12	6/16/58	no deaths, eight exposures
> Los Alamos		12/30/58	1 death, two others exposed
> INEEL			10/16/59	no deaths, three exposures
> INEEL			1/25/61	no significant exposures
> Recuplex (Hanford) 4/7/62	no deaths, three exposures
> Wood River		7/24/64	1 death, two others exposed
> Windscale (UK)	8/24/70	no significant exposures
> INEEL			10/17/78	2 deaths, others exposed
> 
> 
> 

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