"Neil Gould" wrote in message
ink.net...
Hi,

Recently, Tom Sixkiller posted:

"Neil Gould" wrote in message
What's the security risk, here? What do you think would happen if
someone flew a Cherokee into a plant?
Here are some things to consider:

* The easiest "target" would be one of the cooling towers. A Cherokee
would simply compact itself on the side of the towers and fall off.

* The reactor in the plants around here is surrounded by other
buildings. It would be *very* difficult to hit the building that
contains the reactor. But, the result of doing so with a Cherokee
would be similar to the result of the 172 that hit the office
building in Fla. You might break a window or two in the building.

The fear of danger caused by someone flying a GA plane into a nuclear
power plant is simply irrational. There is a *far* greater risk of
catastrophe from poor maintenance practices in the every day use of
these plants, as can be exemplified by the Davis-Besse fiasco that
we're dealing with here in Ohio.

Poor maintenance in a government run/regulated facility?

The nuclear plants in Ohio are run by private companies, just as other
utilities. I suspect that many, if not most plants are owned and operated
by private utilities.

As for poor regulation... well, that's one of the by-products of relaxed
rules and deregulation.

_relaxed_ , how?

I'd like to know your definition of "deregulation". Remember: The roughly
same poeple that regulate the nuclear industry also regulate avaition
safety. (shudder!!!)



In this particular case, the Davis-Besse plant has
been down for the last couple of years because of maintenance and
operation problems. The problem that got the most attention was a hole
about the size of a football eaten almost all the way through the reactor
lid by dripping acid. Had that gone far enough that the operating pressure
caused the lid to fracture, a good portion of Northern Ohio would have
been in deep trouble.

I'd heard something along that line -- do you have a reference with more
detail?


The point, though, is that we are supposedly under tightened
security, so "why wasn't the action deal with more severely"?

The fact is, we're under the *illusion* of tightened security, based on
being pointlessly harrassed in fairly meaningless ways. And, in areas
where we have some *real* problems, we're far too laxadaisical. A Cherokee
is just not likely to do any serious damage to a building, much less one
built to the standards of a nuclear (or *any*) power plant. Visit one
sometime, and imagine yourself in the cockpit trying to do some damage. To
present such as scenario as a plausible threat to our safety is one
version of terrorist activity, as far as I'm concerned.

Oh, I know howthey're built...and you're right -- most of it is meaningless
scare tactics.