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At 03:27 PM 3/26/2003 , "Jim Mackinnon wrote to rdh:
Re: Please remove me from e-mail distribution list
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Dear Mr. Mackinnon,
I hope this means you won't be writing about nuclear issues anymore. If so, please let me know the name of the reporter at the Beacon (are those gamma rays?) Journal who will. In either case, please forward this email to your editor. (Thank you in advance).
Also, since you've made your comment (in a manner of speaking, anyway) about my writing, I've taken a few of your scribbles and commented on them in return:
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On Mar. 20th, 2002 Jim Mackinnon wrote in the Beacon-Journal:
"Keeping nuclear power plants safe following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks remains the industry's No. 1 concern."
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Do you really believe that? I think "keeping them operating in an increasingly impossible climate of legitimate public fear and disgust" is a much more accurate description of their #1 concern. Look on the web for my "25 simple ways a small group of terrorists could destroy a nuclear power plant" and see if you can get answers that make sense from the NRC. (If you can't find it, or don't have it in your email files from my previous mailings to you (which I presume you've had the good sense to store, though I admit to being a generally optimistic fellow), I can send you a copy.) -- rdh
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On Mar 29th, 2002 Jim Mackinnon wrote in the Beacon-Journal:
"No radiation was released into the environment, and officials say that if the acid had breached the reactor vessel head, safety systems would have shut down the reactor immediately."
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Shouldn't you try to verify for yourself the veracity (or lack thereof) of that offiical's statement? It's total poppycock! Radiation is released every day from nuclear power plants to the public, for starters. Even without a leak that repeatedly clogs their filters. (Besides, have you ever seen a perfect filter? Of course not, and neither have I.) But more even more important, the safety systems might NOT have been able to shut down the reactor at all! An explosive ejection of the control rod could have damaged other control rods, or even shattered the whole reactor pressure vessel head! -- rdh
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On April 12th, 2002 Jim Mackinnon wrote in the Beacon-Journal:
"FirstEnergy hopes to use robots to do much of the repair work."
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They've undoubtedly used lots of automatons, but probably not many robots. -- rdh
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On Apr 5th, 2002 Jim Mackinnon wrote in the Beacon-Journal:
"When Nuclear Regulatory Commission officials unveil their preliminary findings this morning on how and why boric acid damaged the Davis-Besse nuclear power plant, they will be in a modern school auditorium built largely with revenue from that plant."
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Now, isn't that nice? Of course, that's pretty irrelevant compared to the cost of a MELTDOWN, which you didn't mention, and probably never have. That article was full of that sort of stuff, with people saying, if I understand their snips correctly, that the plant must be safe because, after all, it's there. That was the logic you blithely presented. But just a few weeks earlier, Davis-Besse had nearly melted down, yet safety is assured because they've always been a good employer and give generously to the local community in return for their silence? A lot of people a long way from Davis Besse will die if there is a meltdown. The local population should be given the facts about the dangers they are facing -- and forcing the rest of us to face -- not a pep speech about how nice the money the plant steals from America's future and gives to the local citizens feels when they spend it.
The 1982 CRAC-2 estimated “Worst Case” Casualties from a Davis-Besse meltdown: 84,400; Property Damage: $84 Billion. Have you ever published those figures? Have you ever discussed what a shameful underestimation those figures surely are, just to balance your "facts" about who paid for the auditorium, the this, the that, and all the other accoutrements of life the utility has passed out around the plant? Not to scare the public or anything -- leave that to the terrorists (that is, the guys in suits from the NRC who permit this crime). -- rdh
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On Apr 6, 2002, Jim Mackinnon wrote in the Beacon-Journal:
"``We have been open, honest and truthful,'' said Bob Saunders, president of FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Co."
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So you let them say that in your article, but did you ever print a correction or retraction, once you learned they HAD lied to you? About their prior hints of the problem that they ignored , about photos of the damage, etc.? -- rdh
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On Apr. 6th, 2002 Jim Mackinnon wrote in the Beacon-Journal:
"Officials said just a 3/16 -inch-thick lining of stainless steel inside the reactor vessel head prevented a nearly devastating ``loss of coolant'' accident."
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What's the word "nearly" doing in that sentence? It doesn't belong. Also, last month (April, 2003) at San Onofre's annual meeting, and NRC official said "3/8th's" thickness for the liner. Have you ever actually seen it? How thick is it? Is it thicker or thinner, or about as thick as, say, your skull?
In short, Jim, I've must say, your writing leaves a lot of facts out. Who needs terrorists when we've got the American Media sucking up like that to the Nuclear Mafia?
Sincerely,
Russell Hoffman
Concerned Citizen
Carlsbad, CA
URL of the Beacon Journal:
http://www.ohio.com/mld/beaconjournal/
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