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Earthquakes predicted for San Onofre nuclear plant area

Nuclear plant is a disaster in waiting Ricardo Nicol, The Orange County Register 24 March 2010, According to the Uniform Building Code, which establishes standards for the construction of safe buildings in the U.S., the San Onofre nuclear plant is located in the world’s highest seismic risk zone (Zone 4). The San Onofre nuclear plant area is riddled with land and offshore earthquake faults, many of them discovered after the structural design and construction of the existing reactors.

According to many seismologists, the probability of a major earthquake in the California coastal zone in the foreseeable future is a near certainty. An added hazard is the possibility of an offshore earthquake creating a tsunami of enormous force slamming against and destroying all kinds of structures along the coast.
Very large, deadly radioactive fallout resulting from damage to the nuclear plant is certainly a possibility, but large-scale evacuation of the population would be impossible if the damage was caused by an earthquake. In the recent past (20 years), major earthquakes in the Los Angeles and San Francisco areas have rendered freeways useless by buckling the roadbeds and collapsing upper decks and overpass bridges.

Letter: Nuclear plant is a disaster in waiting | nuclear, earthquake, plant – News – The Orange County Register

March 26, 2010 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | climate change, safety, USA | antinuclear, nuclear secrecy, nuclear weapons, radiation, radioactive, reactor