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#81
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OT T Boone Pickens
Jim Yanik wrote:
"J. Clarke" wrote in : dpb wrote: J. Clarke wrote: dpb wrote: wrote: nuke plants have that little problem with waste hazardous for a million years, and make excellent terrorists targets. That has yet to be demonstrated... Uh, while I don't agree that they are particularly excellent terrorist targets, the lack of demonstration is hardly reassuring. That they aren't is pretty much self-evident to anyone who knows anything about them...there are far easier and more likely to be useful targets as has been amply demonstrated already. the used fuel pools are in unhardened steel buildings, a airliner, or small plane into one of those buildings would make thousands of miles of land unihabitabe. ... And how, precisely, do you think this magical event is going to happen? We've had this discussion before and your vision of some nuclear explosion is simply not physically realizable. He'd not talking about a nuclear explosion, he's talking about flying something explosive into the waste retention area, thus scattering high level waste over a wide area. I don't think he can make a credible scenario out of that, either... Terrorists buy/rent/borrow/steal, say, a Cessna Caravan, load it up with a ton and a half of Semtex, and fly it into the building. will that plane carry 3000 lbs? It will carry 4,000 plus a pilot and fuel for 100 miles or so with a 45 minute reserve. will the entire load of Semtex detonate? That's not such an easy task. I'm sure that the instructors at the Al Quaeda Terrorist Academy are up to the task of teaching their people how to do that. and explosions vent UPwards. The heavy fuel rods will be under water. I doubt they would be scattered much,if at all. So how many lives are you willing to stake on that doubt? and where does one FIND Semtex,a Czech explosive,in the US? Geez, do you have Asperger's syndrome or some such? For "Semtex" substitute any other suitable explosive--I'm sure that the Al Quaeda Terrorist Academy provides its graduates with a long list of suitable materials plus the knowledge to improvise if needed. -- -- --John to email, dial "usenet" and validate (was jclarke at eye bee em dot net) |
#82
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OT T Boone Pickens
In article ,
Jim Yanik wrote: will that plane carry 3000 lbs? will the entire load of Semtex detonate? That's not such an easy task. and explosions vent UPwards. The heavy fuel rods will be under water. I doubt they would be scattered much,if at all. and where does one FIND Semtex,a Czech explosive,in the US? Technically any explosive including good ole dynamite would do the trick at 3K lbs. This is less in tonnage than Controlled Demolition and similar companies use to pancake buildings, so getting it all to detonate when it is packed that tightly isn't all that hard. I'd have to look over my old notes from the 70s, but IIRC once semtex (or C-4 for that matter) is started, that much go pretty much sympathetic with block one being initiated by a blasting cap, block 2 initiated by block 1, etc. However, as I mentioned, it has been about 30 years since I had a reason to look that stuff up... Explosions pretty much go in every direction. But, like me, it tends to concentrate in the path least resistance. Thus the theory behind shaped charges, but the math and engineering of doing that in this case is beyond my meager skills. Shaped charges also need to specifically placed to get the best bang for the buck (so to speak) and that would be almost impossible in this case. However, as with much of the terrorism threats, we are overthinking this scenario. From the T's viewpoint, getting in there and blowing up anything with the name nuclear before it is enough. As was noted by that great sage and noted philosopher Vladimir Ilyich Lenin: "The purpose of terrorism is to terrorize." They don't have to get it exactly right to achieve their goals. |
#83
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OT T Boone Pickens
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#84
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OT T Boone Pickens
J. Clarke wrote:
.... and explosions vent UPwards. The heavy fuel rods will be under water. I doubt they would be scattered much,if at all. So how many lives are you willing to stake on that doubt? .... It's the problem hallerb has w/ his exaggerated proposed scenario--it just isn't a reasonable physical conclusion to what would happen given the initiating event. Certainly not the "thousands of miles" idea--it would surely make a mess of the building, some of the support structure and perhaps scatter a few fission products around the site, but doing much more than that would be really, really tough to get to happen. Nothing nuclear is even physically possible; nothing thermal is beyond remote. Loss of shielding directly over the storage pool would require simply staying away w/o proper protection if the water pool were lowered. -- |
#87
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OT T Boone Pickens
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#88
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OT T Boone Pickens
On Jul 26, 9:42*am, Jim Yanik wrote:
Red Green wrote : dpb wrote : wrote: On Fri, 25 Jul 2008 13:32:56 GMT, "JC" wrote: . * The last thing we need to do is turn a beautiful ocean view into an industrial one. past 12 miles,you can't see the platforms. The discussion was about windmills, not oil platforms. But in either case, I have no problem if they are located offshore out of sight of land. What about the view from the water? We don't seem to mind turning the beach into condos and parking lots Not to mention the 2-legged whales in droves... * Oh, you mean the "Wal-Mart Babes" as I call them :-) Or, what's so different to watching a multi-thousand ton ship that is supposedly "scenic" as compared to a windmill that takes up far less area--just that it stays still??? *It seems somehow an incongruous argument to me... -- oil spills are far more common from tankers than from oil platforms. the oil platforms in the Gulf of Mexico did not leak after Katrina. I agree with that and the point about Katrina is an excellent one, showing how safe and clean current offshore oil can be. Regarding the other poster's comment about watching a multi-thousand ton ship from shore, along just about all of the NJ coast you won't see those ships anywhere near shore. The shipping channels are about 12 miles offshore the length of the coast. You generally only see large container ships, tankers, clearly in the very small areas where they come into port. On a very clear day, you might catch a glimpse of them out at 12 miles in the distance, but if you did see them, it's not a valid analogy to windmills. In the coastal shipping lanes, a few ships go by an hour. In the case of windmills, we're talking about farms of thousands of them and potentially only a couple miles offshore, standing 375 ft high. -- Jim Yanik jyanik at kua.net- Hide quoted text - - Show quoted text - |
#89
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OT T Boone Pickens
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#91
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OT T Boone Pickens
dpb wrote:
wrote: On Sat, 26 Jul 2008 13:39:27 -0500, dpb wrote: I seriously doubt it would do more than make a decent hole; I think the chances of it penetrating are minimal at best and "like a bullet" are like slim and none and Slim left town. ` It would certainly make a decent sized hole and "bullet" doesn't even describe the effect of a well designed shaped charge. take a look at anti tank rounds on google Which don't look anything at all like an engine block as a projectile. Nor does the containment building look like tank armor so results aren't particularly similar. It's difficult to factually discuss much of reactor protection since scenarios and all are restricted data. Consequently simply can't say much more specifically about what has been looked at other than a significant amount of work has been done to quantify risk and vulnerabilities in order to deal with contingencies. An engine block won't do it. A whole effing jet fighter won't do it (that's been tested with a similar structure). A geezly 707 hitting flat out won't do it (that was the design criterion when the original standards were set, and I'm sure the margins were very large). What a shaped charge will do is another story, but rigging a shaped charge in kamikaze could be difficult--you'd need to do a good deal of reengineering on the plane I think to get the explosive charge into the right place and still have somewhere for the pilot to sit. Now, if you want a _nasty_ scenario consider some group stealing one of Virgin Galactic's White Knights and putting a shaped charge on it in place of the SpaceShip. That gives them 30 tons of payload on a fully aerobatic airframe and pretty much complete freedom on the design. But stealing one of NASA's Shuttle transporters and mounting the bomb in place of the Shuttle could do even worse--that could give them 75 tons of explosives. The trouble with both those scenarios though is that they have to steal a very high profile aircraft and then hide it somewhere (in an unusually tall and rather larger hangar) while they mount the bomb. Probably be just as easy to just steal a B-52 and a load of bunker-busters to begin with. -- -- --John to email, dial "usenet" and validate (was jclarke at eye bee em dot net) |
#92
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OT T Boone Pickens
Mastermind wrote:
J. Clarke wrote: dpb wrote: But stealing one of NASA's Shuttle transporters and mounting the bomb in place of the Shuttle could do even worse--that could give them 75 tons of explosives. The trouble with both those scenarios though is that they have to steal a very high profile aircraft and then hide it somewhere (in an unusually tall and rather larger hangar) while they mount the bomb. Share some of your thoughts with us on how to snag a space shuttle and where to hide it. I think you may be on to something if it weren't for a few minor details. Who said anything about a Space Shuttle? I was talking about one of _these_: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shuttle_Carrier_Aircraft As to how to "snag one", you walk on, start the engines, and fly off, same as you steal any other airplane. It's probably best to not steal it while there's a Space Shuttle on top. And I stated specifically that hiding it was going to be a problem, so why are you asking me where to hide it? That cargo bay in the back would be a kick ass place to store explosives. What "cargo bay in the back"? The transporter's "cargo bay" isn't any different from the cargo bay in any other 747. -- -- --John to email, dial "usenet" and validate (was jclarke at eye bee em dot net) |
#93
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OT T Boone Pickens
J. Clarke wrote:
dpb wrote: But stealing one of NASA's Shuttle transporters and mounting the bomb in place of the Shuttle could do even worse--that could give them 75 tons of explosives. The trouble with both those scenarios though is that they have to steal a very high profile aircraft and then hide it somewhere (in an unusually tall and rather larger hangar) while they mount the bomb. Share some of your thoughts with us on how to snag a space shuttle and where to hide it. I think you may be on to something if it weren't for a few minor details. That cargo bay in the back would be a kick ass place to store explosives. |
#94
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OT T Boone Pickens
J. Clarke wrote:
.... ... A geezly 707 hitting flat out won't do it (that was the design criterion when the original standards were set, and I'm sure the margins were very large). What a shaped charge will do is another story, ... The original analyses of containment, etc. are, of course, in the FSAR and there's much available in the NRC dockets on those. They're interesting but marginally relevant to other specific terrorist threats. The work specifically in that area is treated mostly as restricted data for obvious reasons and so isn't readily available (the old saw "if I told you what we worked on and the results, I'd have to shoot you" ). -- |
#95
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OT T Boone Pickens
dpb wrote:
J. Clarke wrote: ... ... A geezly 707 hitting flat out won't do it (that was the design criterion when the original standards were set, and I'm sure the margins were very large). What a shaped charge will do is another story, ... The original analyses of containment, etc. are, of course, in the FSAR and there's much available in the NRC dockets on those. They're interesting but marginally relevant to other specific terrorist threats. The work specifically in that area is treated mostly as restricted data for obvious reasons and so isn't readily available (the old saw "if I told you what we worked on and the results, I'd have to shoot you" ). I ran into an even worse one once. "If I told _me_ what I worked on and the results, I'd have to shoot myself". Did show the Powers that Be a big hole in their security though. -- -- --John to email, dial "usenet" and validate (was jclarke at eye bee em dot net) |
#96
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OT T Boone Pickens
J. Clarke wrote:
.... I ran into an even worse one once. "If I told _me_ what I worked on and the results, I'd have to shoot myself". Did show the Powers that Be a big hole in their security though. Well, at least the reactor security stuff wasn't nearly as painful to work with as DOE Q... -- |
#97
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OT T Boone Pickens
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#98
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OT T Boone Pickens
dpb wrote:
HeyBub wrote: .... Windmills require NO maintenance (except to turn the vane so they'll quit pumping). Snicker, snort... You've obviously never tried to keep a bunch of them running on a large ranch... .... Took a while to find it on the web, but for the prime example... Windmills: surviving on the Plains By DARLA BRACKEN .... "The XIT Ranch had 325 windmills over its vast 3 million acres and a special full time crew to take care of them. There were many different types and designs and hundreds of companies manufacturing them between the 1880s and into the 1920s and 1930s." While others weren't as large as the XIT, the fulltime windmill crew was a common occupation until thru the 30's into the war years on the High Plains. The manpower shortage during the war really was the beginning of the emphasis to shift to alternate power sources although it didn't become terribly prevalent until the 50s and 60s as electric power distribution lines expanded drastically w/ the advent of the electric co-op's(1). It was also dangerous business often, having to climb a tower w/ a runaway vane after the brakeline had broken being one of most perilous. .... (1) We were supplied totally by wind until after WWII when in '48 got REA hookup for the first time. Until then, both windmill and Delco 32V windcharger system were our water and only electric power on the place. The windcharger was immediately decommisioned, of course, the windmill continued until the well casing failed and a new well was drilled in the mid/late 50s. It, of course, used submergible pump and much larger capacity. -- |
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