Nuclear jet crash 'could kill millions'

I'm with Browha on this one.

I'm no expert on the plants, but my son was in the Navy and he was a Nuke (certified technician for the nuclear reactors.) He says they're well designed and pretty bomb-proof.

I do know that regular power plants aren't usually that fragile, either (at least the new ones.)

People,

modern nuclear plants are designed to withstand an impact of a
commerical jet. Just do some research... I came across some materials
on that many years ago. I'm not saying all of them are safe,
but the old ones are indeed closed or being closed. Chernobyl was an
old design and it didn't have (obviously) a hard shell around it.

On top of that, in all likelihood an impact would be a grazing one, as
reactors are in fact rather compact objects and pretty hard to hit
head on. Combined with the fudge factor always present in the design
to be on the safe side, I doubt the reinforced concrete shell can be breached.

I've been around a few reactors and I saw the active core of one with my own eyes (through 8m of water), so I kinda sorta know what I'm talking about. It was a pretty glow, by the way.


[Edited on 26-5-2004 by Aelita]

Thank you
It's just ye-olde-government playing up the hype...
consider the fact that they recently warned everyone to be suspicious of anyone wearing a backpack (basically), or wearing long-sleeve clothing in the summer...
(I cant remember where I got the list, I'm confident it's on the BBC though)

The saftey precautions nuclear power plants have make up for 1/4 of the cost it costs to run the place.

20cm thick steal walls inside 1 meter thick walls. 8 inchs and just over 3 feet.

They are designed to shut down the instant an earthquake happens, I am resonably sure the same thing would happen if a plane were to crash into it.

"The analyses used a fully-fuelled Boeing 767-400 of over 200 tonnes as the basis, at 560 km/h - the maximum speed for precision flying near the ground. The wingspan is greater than the diameter of reactor containment buildings and the 4.3 tonne engines are 15 metres apart. Hence analyses focused on single engine direct impact on the centreline and on the impact of the entire aircraft if the fuselage hit the centreline (in which case the engines would ricochet off the sides). In each case no part of the aircraft or its fuel would penetrate the containment. Looking at spent fuel storage pools, similar analyses showed no breach. Dry storage and transport casks retained their integrity. "There would be no release of radionuclides to the environment"."
- www.uic.com.au...

And as far as my knoweledge goes I beleive most plants build next to water are below the water level so they can be flooded, to cool and contain the plant if anything goes wrong.

Okay, this thread is in need of some serious debunking. I am a nuclear engineer, I have worked at a nuclear power plant, and I can assure you that they are safe.

First off, it'd take a lot of work to turn the fuel used in a nuc plant into a bomb. You need enough fissile mass concentrated into a small enough space, which is impossible with the fuel (fissile isotopes only account for about 5% of the fuel, while in a bomb it's 95%-~98%). Forget the idea of kinetic disassembly (I love that term) ever happening at a nuc power plant.

There are essentially three protective barriers between the fuel and the outside: a thin cladding around each pin, a carbon steel reactor vessel that's about 30 cm thick, and the reinforced concrete containment/shield building, which is several feet thick. The shield buildings were designed with one design basis being the crash of a 707 into the building. Shorty after 9/11, the US NRC did a reevaluation that confirmed that a shield building could withstand the impact of a 747.

That said, the worst that could happen if an airplane managed to crash through the shield building would be something akin to a dirty bomb, not a nuclear explosion. The press really likes to hype dirty bombs up, but it's doubtful radioactive material would be spread very far. Since nearly every nuc plant is out in the middle of nowhere, no major cities are threatened.

Oh, and forget about the idea of terrorists taking over a nuc plant like you seen in the movies. First off, they couldn't do anything remotely dangerous to the general public, and there's no way they'd ever get in. There are lots of highly trained security officers patrolling the site with AR-15s and multiple barriers to entry (the entire site is surrounded by a 12-foot razor wire fence and multi-ton concrete blocks or stones). The local law enforcement and national guard are always on call, and those terrorists would be dead quick'r than you can say "Jiha..."

Still, if you live close to a nuc plant and are scared, then move. If you don't live anywhere near one, then don't worry. Plain and simple.

Thanks PurdueNuc

I'm happy to see someone with credible knowedge (or atleast claiming credible knowledge) tell us we are safe and to reinforce what i believed to be true.

Originally posted by browha
We are not discussing a jet fueled by nuclear engines.... No such thing exists yet, to my knowledge.
Chernoble was a nuclear fission plant as well.. Unless you know more specific technically details I dont?
We're discussing crashing a jet into a nuclear power plant to cause a chain reaction

You can bet if it is in the "planning stages" for our consumption...it is already being flown !



Atomic Wings
A new mini-reactor revives the dream of a nuclear-powered aircraft.
BY JIM WILSON
Illustration by Paul Dimare

The new hafnium-fueled reactor emits so little radiation it could be easily integrated into civilian airport operations.

After more than six decades of research, the first atom-powered airplane is cleared for takeoff. Although details of the project remain classified, a description of this remarkable aircraft has begun to emerge from technical conferences and declassified engineering studies. The plane will be both familiar and unique. Familiar in that it will resemble a Northrop Grumman Global Hawk, the bulbous-nosed unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) that the U.S. Air Force has used to track enemy movements in Afghanistan and Iraq. Unique because its nuclear reactor is unlike any other. Rather than split heavy elements or fuse light atoms--as in fission and fusion reactors--it will use what is known as a triggered isomer reaction. If this new powerplant, called a quantum nucleonic reactor, performs as scientists expect, its effect on the aircraft industry may prove as revolutionary as the introduction of the jet engine.


Ungainly Elegance
To the trained eye, the ungainly Global Hawk is a thing of beauty. A triumph of function over form, its whale-snout nose presents a tiny radar cross section. The thickly shrouded rear-mounted engine, located high in the tail, presents a minimal heat signature. Even the paint, which appears faded, serves a purpose: It helps dissipate heat from the plane's electronic bay. Together, these design features make the Global Hawk virtually invisible as it loiters at 45,000 ft., directing its powerful radar and high-resolution cameras on trouble spots.

One improvement would make the Global Hawk the perfect surveillance platform: eliminating the need to top off its fuel tanks. For UAVs operating deep within hostile airspace, refueling requires dashing hundreds, sometimes thousands, of miles to a friendly landing field. It is chiefly for that reason that the Global Hawk has been selected as a testbed for one of the boldest experiments in aviation history. Project managers for Northrop Grumman and the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory tell POPULAR MECHANICS they have begun discussions that could lead to the conversion of a Global Hawk to a nuclear-powered aircraft.

If the plan takes shape, a Global Hawk will be pulled off the production line and undergo extensive airframe and powerplant modifications. Chief among these will be the addition of some 2700 pounds of radiation shielding. Installed between the tail section and the main electronics bay, the shielding will create a "hot cell." In this area, which will be designed to minimize leakage of radiation, engineers will install the world's first airborne quantum nucleonic reactor.

popularmechanics.com...

Any proof of this? I have never heard of it, and I was under the impression it was relatively impossible

I'm not familiar with the "quantum nucleonic reactor," so I'll have to do some research before commenting on that. However, I can give a little history on nuclear aircraft. In the 50s the USAF did consider building an aircraft powered by a nuclear reactor, for the same reasons the navy wanted nuclear powered subs. The principle reason this never made it very far is because the weight of the shielding required to keep the crew alive would be too great, so if the aircraft could actually make it off the ground, it wouldn't be able to carry much payload. However, with the advent of UAVs, this certainly presents some interesting possiblities. It will be interesting to see develops out of this.

Here's a couple links:

www.ufx.org...
www.megazone.org...

Originally posted by browha
They have thought about this.
The 9/11 strike that tried to hit a nuclear power plant (Pennsylvania?) wouldnt have worked. I have watched a video of an F4 jet flying into a concrete wall (To test it's strength) of the same thickness as what you would expect at a nuclear power plant... The wall didnt move, let alone crack. The plane literally disintergrated... This idea was included in the design of the nuclear plants

Check out where this video you watched was filmed and the real reason.
www.sandia.gov...