nuclear-news

Preface by Washington’s Blog:  Investigative journalism requires asking questions in the face of potential cover-ups.  Guest writer George Eliason is asking question, and admitting both that (1) the reports are unconfirmed and (2) he doesn’t have the necessary expertise to render an authoritative opinion on this issue.

But since the stakes are so high, it is worth asking the question.

By George Eliason, an American journalist living in Ukraine.

Over the last week more publications including Zero Hedge have started reporting on the possibility of a still developing nuclear problem at the largest nuclear plant in Europe. This news has been widely circulated in Eastern Europe over the last few weeks.

The problem in Ukraine has been and remains verification. Ukrainian sources have not been forthcoming. When this first occurred I was contacted through a 2nd party and told directly after the officially reported transformer incident a radiation spike was observed in Crimea which is 140km away from Zaporozhye nuclear power plant. This spike was small against background radiation but noticeable on a geiger counter. I was also given hacked files of the emergency conversation that happened at the plant that day. They are included at the bottom of the article. The closeness to what is coming to light makes them too close to be ignored………

Ukraine reported an incident (non-nuclear) which was a transformer short circuiting, not an accident which is used for radiological issues. This was carried across the nuclear industry forums that talked about it. The case was closed on that basis.

As reported at Zero Hedge–Two days ago we reported of the odd coincidence of a 2nd emergency shutdown at Ukraine’s Zaporozhye Nuclear reactor – Europe’s largest nuclear power plant – following our earlier fears of disinformation. Today, we get information of a leaked report sourced from three different place – unconfirmed for now (but RT is trying to verify) – that Ukrainian nuclear scientists misled the public and a radioactive leak has been detected – citing the country’s emergency services claiming that levels of radiation are 16.3 times the legally permitted norm.

What does 16.3 times allowable (legal) mean? In a pre-Fukashima world if any nuclear plant in the US were to report 1X allowable radiation/ steam (contamination) release every major publication in the country would be focused on that event.

Allowable release at nuclear power plants falls under a Zero tolerance policy. At Zaporozhye power plant background radiation before the event registered at 10-12 counts per minute on a geiger counter. At 50 counts it does not cause an alarm but is something to monitor.

At 100 counts the threshold for alarm is reached and radiological personal protective gear might be warranted. Zaporozhye is well beyond that threshold now………..

What We Know about Zaporozhye

We now know that radiation was released and reports of a steam blow off are starting to surface. Unfortunately this is in line with information I was told about a fire in the cooling system and a contaminated side steam pipe burst inside the containment (their word sarcophagus). We know people that have left the area have reported that iodine tablets are being handed out to people that live close to the plant.

We know that the plant shut down all social media for plant workers so they would not talk about the incident. This was a highly unusual move for a transformer problem.

A second reactor(#6) has been shutdown at the same plant and restarted at the same plant on December 28th or has it. This linked document shows that unit #6 is still down on December 29th.

A third at South Ukraine Nuclear Power plant which has been testing Westinghouse fuel assemblies is in an abnormally long shutdown. Normal is 30-40 days. This is predicted at 120 days.

This is not the first time this year Zaporozhye had unscheduled shutdowns.

In the spring Pravy Sektor tried unsuccessfully to storm nuclear power plants 3 times. Later the government of Ukraine ordered that they guard nuclear material, nuclear facilities, and even nuclear waste through their troops in the Ukrainian National Guard.

As surreal as it sounds Poroshenko’s government put the terrorists that tried to take nuclear plants by force in charge…………http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2014/12/largest-nuclear-plant-europe-located-ukraine-suffered-major-accident.html