X-Message-Number: 20680 Date: Sat, 21 Dec 2002 22:59:32 -0500 From: Thomas Donaldson <> Subject: promised reference Hi everyone! A few days ago I put up a message about terrorists versus nuclear reactors in which I basically said that this problem had been studied and looked like one which would be far less serious than much popular thinking seems to suggest. I said also that I would give a reference to the article which influenced me to this conclusion. So here is the reference: SCIENCE 297(2002)(1997-1999) Its title is "Nuclear power plants and their fuel as terrorist targets" and it is by 15 people, most of whom were not working with a nuclear company (but many had retired). Among the things they cite is a study of the question of what would happen if a large commercial airplane were to run into the outside of a nuclear reactor. This involved not only explicit tests with (unmanned!) airplanes against walls with the same parameters as those around nuclear reactors, but computer calculatons too. It seems that a plane at 480 mph going into a wall 3.6 meters thick would penetrate the wall by about 5 centimeters. The article in SCIENCE discussed other issues too, of course. Best wishes and long long life, Thomas Donaldson Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=20680