Nuclear power plants are vulnerable to terrorists, and attacks on them could cause much more damage than Tuesday’s disasters, says Tom Clements, head of the Nuclear Control Institute in Washington, D.C. He says the reactors’ containment systems were not built to withstand attacks from the air. But that’s not all. Clements says, “It’s quite apparent that the facilities are very difficult to defend. I mean, [terrorists] can just go right in, over the fence, take out the guards, and get in.” In some simulated attacks, security systems failed at about half the U.S. reactors tested.
