There is an NRC event report out today regarding the discovery of a shipment of RADIOACTIVE "Kleenex box holders" from New Jersey destined for a Bed Bath and Beyond store in California. Yet, the NRC event reports remain completely silent about the; "REACTOR LEAK" which caused a "partial shutdown" of North Anna nuclear plant. While the identification of metal "Kleenex boxes" contaminated with COBALT 60 is important, it pales in comparison the Fukushima like risk coming out of the North Anna nuclear plants.
The question obviously rises: are the problems at North Anna Nuclear Plant being underreported because the NRC approved the restart on earthquake damaged UNIT 1 based on an inspection of UNIT 2 ? Imagine two airplanes involved in the same crash landing, and the FAA certifying both planes as safe to fly after they have only inspect ONE of the aircraft for air worthiness. That is essentially what has happened at North Anna after the August 5.8 earthquake in Virginia shook those nuclear plants at a level greater than for which they were designed.
Obviously it must be very embarrassing for the NRC every time the North Anna plant has to shut down for an issue that correlates with the 5.8 earth quake in Virginia, especially when those issues might have been caught in an in-depth inspection. It is only reasonable to assume that such reporting would be delayed as long as possible.
The take away is that residents of North Anna, and anyone down wind or down stream should not rely on the NRC event pages as early warning systems for North Anna Nuclear. But it is worse than that, every partial shutdown and restart cycle of those nuclear plants is just one step close to a fatigue failure. Moreover, from a probabilistic view point, the most dangerous time period in the nuclear cycle is during a manual shutdown.
It would be wise for anyone in North Anna threat zone to take cost effective risk mitigation measures; the cheapest and simplest of which would be to have a supply of IOSAT on hand. Given the Russian Nuclear Roulette wheel the NRC and North Anna Nuclear are spinning right now in Virginia, we believe even greater risk mitigation measures are warranted for the wise.
see the video update here
http://pissinontheroses.blogspot.com/2012/01/bed-bath-and-beyond-radioactive-kleenex.html
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