NEWS FLASH: You will not be killed in a nuclear explosion, probably, at least not from muchostorm Sandy.
Shortly after the worst flooding receded, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission announced that the Oyster Creek nuclear power plant in New Jersey had raised its action level to “alert.” Everyone (not everyone, really, but the sort of people who easily bug out) bugged out. An “alert,” we’ll mention, is one notch above “literally nothing is happening” and a notch below “hm, this isn’t good.” An ABC story from yesterday suggested that there were “Problems at Five Nuke Plants,” but that alert was the worst of the problems. Don’t read that article, especially if you’re the sort of person who easily bugs out.
And anyway, that alert is over. From the New York Times’ Sandy liveblog:
With Hurricane Sandy’s surge receding, the Oyster Creek nuclear plant, in Lacey Township, N.J., ended its “alert” at 3:52 a.m. on Wednesday and returned to normal operations, meaning a shutdown for refueling that began a week before the storm. …
The storm disrupted the grid at several reactors and forced their shutdown, but only Oyster Creek reached the “alert” stage, a status that requires notification of various government agencies but no public action.
So that’s that.
Now, if you were actually looking to bug out about something, how about the security of our nuclear arsenal? Again, the Times:
The security guards at a nuclear weapons plant who failed to stop an 82-year-old nun from reaching a bomb fuel storage building earlier this year were also cheating on its recertification exam, according to an internal investigation by the Department of Energy, which owns the weapons plant.
In case you didn’t read that closely, let me highlight the key points.
The security guards at a nuclear weapons plant who failed to stop an 82-year-old nun from reaching a bomb fuel storage building earlier this year were also cheating on its recertification exam, according to an internal investigation by the Department of Energy, which owns the weapons plant.
Apocastorm Sandy doesn’t have shit on Sister Megan.