Comment 61115

By Undustrial (registered) - website | Posted March 17, 2011 at 17:59:12 in reply to Comment 61030

The thing is...the Chalk River facilities ARE in a seismically active area. I heard a quote that they're designed to withstand a 5.2, but haven't been able to confirm it with any non-twitter source. In any case, it's pretty clear that the laboratories aren't nearly as well built as Fukushima.

http://earthquakescanada.nrcan.gc.ca/stn...

And a heavy-water reactor has already seen a level five incident there, back in the 1950s, with many similar elements to the current crisis (hydrogen explosion, core breach etc), but no earthquake.

http://media.cns-snc.ca/history/nrx.html

Safety engineers have been trying to get this thing decomissioned for years. It's been shut down for a large chunk of the last four years, over leaks and safety concerns. And while the area isn't terribly populated, It is right on the Ottawa River, which then flows right down to our capitol.

Should we panic, stockpile iodine pills and dig bomb shelters? That would be silly. But not drawing the obvious parallels here is a very dangerous gamble.

"Today, the notion of progress in a single line without goal or limit seems perhaps the most parochial notion of a very parochial century." — Lewis Mumford

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