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Today in History – January 24: Pure luck stops two nuclear bombs destroying US city

By Nick Pearson, Jan 24, 2026, https://www.9news.com.au/world/today-in-history-january-24-what-happened-on-this-day/67dc0e76-b5a5-4799-8fd0-ef2c401b7812

Two concurrent nuclear explosions over a US town were narrowly averted on January 24, 1961.

A B-52 bomber flying over Goldsboro, North Carolina, started to break up in mid-air after a fuel leak.

The centrifugal forces set off a trigger in the cockpit which would be used to drop the payload in the back of the plane.

That payload was two hydrogen bombs, which dropped out of the plane as it broke up in the sky.

Five of the eight crew were able to bail out safely, but three were killed.

Meanwhile, the two hydrogen bombs fell to the ground.

By pure luck, neither of the weapons exploded.

The first weapon had landed in a field on a farm, landing reasonably softly because of its deployed parachute.

With one of the 24-megaton warheads, there were six interlocking safety mechanisms which needed to be triggered for the bomb to explode.

“When Air Force experts rushed to the North Carolina farm to examine the weapon after the accident, they found that five of the six interlocks had been set off by the fall,” nuclear safety supervisor Parker F. Jones wrote in a 1969 report.

“Only a single switch prevented the 24-megaton bomb from detonating and spreading fire and destruction over a wide area.”

The second bomb landed in a muddy field, leaving a 1.5m hole in the ground.

When it was recovered after a three-day operation, they found the safety switch had been turned to “Armed”.

It created a mystery as to why this bomb did not detonate.

The conclusion from investigators was that the impact from hitting the earth shifted the switch to “Armed”, but that same impact had broken the circuits that would have set the bomb off.

After breaking up on impact and sinking into deep mud, some major components of the bomb have still not been recovered.

If either bomb had detonated, it would have likely wiped out a city of about 30,000 people.

The farmer was paid $100 by the US government for a 61m-radius section of the farm. 

They are still allowed to use the land for agricultural purposes but forbidden from digging more than five feet down.

January 24, 2026 Posted by | incidents, USA | Leave a comment

Nuclear reactor owned by Fukushima plant operator TEPCO to shut down again hours after restart.

By ASSOCIATED PRESS, 22 January 2026 https://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/ap/article-15487139/Nuclear-reactor-owned-Fukushima-plant-operator-TEPCO-suspends-hours-old-restart.html

TOKYO (AP) – A reactor at the world’s largest nuclear power plant that restarted for the first time since the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster is now being shut down again Thursday due to a glitch that occurred hours after the unit’s resumption, its operator said.

The No. 6 reactor at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant in north-central Japan reactivated Wednesday night for the first time in 14 years, as plant workers started removing neutron-absorbing control rods from the core to start stable nuclear fission.

But the process had to be suspended hours later due to a malfunction related to control rods, which are essential to safely starting up and shutting down reactors, the Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings said.

TEPCO, which also manages the wrecked Fukushima plant, said there was no safety issue from the glitch.

Kashiwazak-Kariwa plant chief Takeyuki Inagaki told a news conference that he has decided to shut down the reactor to ensure safety. The operation had to stop when an alarm went off after 52 of the 205 control rods were removed from the core, he said. Inagaki said he hoped to start putting them back in later Thursday to bring the No. 6 reactor to a shutdown.

“The equipment is essential to safe operation, and we will examine it inside out,” he said, adding that the reactor will not be restarted until the cause is found and measures are taken.

“I don’t think this is going to be resolved in a couple of days,” Inagaki said.

The restart at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant was being watched closely since TEPCO also runs the Fukushima Daiichi plant that was ruined in the 2011 quake and tsunami. Resource-poor Japan is accelerating atomic power use to meet soaring electricity needs.

All seven reactors at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa have been dormant since a year after the meltdowns of reactors at the Fukushima plant contaminated the surrounding land with radioactive fallout so severe that some areas are still uninhabitable.

TEPCO is working on the cleanup at the Fukushima site that´s estimated to cost 22 trillion yen ($139 billion). It’s also trying to recover from the damage to its reputation after government and independent investigations blamed the Fukushima disaster on TEPCO´s bad safety culture and criticized it for collusion with safety authorities.

Fourteen other nuclear reactors have restarted across Japan since 2011, but the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant, about 220 kilometers (135 miles) northwest of Tokyo, is the first TEPCO-run unit to resume production.

A restart of the No. 6 reactor could generate an additional 1.35 million kilowatts of electricity, enough to power more than 1 million households in the capital region.

The Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant´s combined output capacity of 8 million kilowatts makes it the world´s largest, though TEPCO plans to resume only two of the seven reactors in coming years.

January 24, 2026 Posted by | Japan, safety | Leave a comment

Chernobyl power plant LOSES external power supply after Russian attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, IAEA warns.

However, last month, Russia was thrown into complete darkness due to a power outage after Ukraine launched a series of drone strikes on Moscow.

Daily Mail By TARYN KAUR PEDLER, FOREIGN NEWS REPORTER, 21 January 2026 

The Chernobyl power plant has lost its external power supply after a series of Russian attacks on Ukraine‘s energy infrastructure, the IAEA has warned.

The International Atomic Energy Agency Director General, Rafael Grossi, reported this morning that several Ukrainian power substations had been affected by large-scale military activity.

One of these was the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, which lost all external power supply, as well as several other power lines to other nuclear plants.

‘The IAEA is actively monitoring developments to assess the impact on nuclear safety,’ added Director General Grossi.

It comes just a day after military intelligence officers in Ukraine warned that Russian missile strikes against the country’s power grid could lead to a ‘second Chernobyl’.

Ukrainian experts say that Vladimir Putin‘s ongoing bombardment of Ukraine’s power grid, cutting electricity and heating in freezing temperatures, could trigger a major disaster.

Serhiy Beskrestnov, a Ukrainian expert in electronic warfare, said that the missiles being launched at energy infrastructure are landing in close proximity to nuclear reactors – some just 300 metres away.

If a Russian strike against sucha substation were to miss, it could trigger a disaster, he warned.

He compared the impact of such an attack to the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, when a catastrophic explosion at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant unleashed huge amounts of radiation, forcing hundreds of thousands of evacuations.

Taking to his Telegram channel on Monday, he said: ‘A miss by an Iskander or a Kinzhal could turn into a second Chernobyl’.

He added that the combination of a Russian strike against such substations, in an attempt to cause a nationwide blackout, as well as their track record for missing targets, made for a very dangerous situation……………………………………….

Ukrainian officials have introduced emergency measures, including temporarily easing curfew restrictions, allowing people to go to public heating centres set up by the authorities, Shmyhal said.

However, last month, Russia was thrown into complete darkness due to a power outage after Ukraine launched a series of drone strikes on Moscow.

Footage emerged from the Russian capital, showing entire tower blocks without light and dead street lamps due to the widespread blackout.

According to the Russian power company PAO Rosseti, over 100,000 residents of Ramensky, Zhukovsky, and Lytkarino were left without electricity in the dead of winter.

Russia claimed the power outage occurred due to an automatic shutdown at a high-voltage electricity substation, though it was unclear whether this was the cause or if it resulted from a Ukrainian drone strike.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s former press secretary, Iuliia Mendel, said at the time: ‘Total blackout hits Moscow region is reported on social media.

‘Over 600,000 people plunged into darkness for more than four hours — no electricity, no mobile signal, total isolation. Drone threat declared across the oblast right now.’

The strike came in the dead of winter, with images revealing a thick layer of snow covering the frigid Moscow streets.

The reported attacks came just a day after Russia accused Ukraine, without providing evidence, of trying to attack President Vladimir Putin’s residence……. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15480223/Chernobyl-power-plant-LOSES-external-power-supply-Russian-attacks-Ukraines-energy-infrastructure-IAEA-warns.html

January 23, 2026 Posted by | safety, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Britain to extend life of ageing nuclear plants to keep the lights on

Hartlepool and Heysham 1 licenses prolonged to 2030 due to ‘dangerous gap’ in power supplies.

Jonathan Leake, Energy Editor, 21 January 2026 

Two of Britain’s oldest nuclear power plants
could be kept running for an extra two years because of an acute
electricity shortage in the UK. Hartlepool and Heysham 1, owned by EDF,
were due to shut down in 2028, but ministers want to extend the operating
licences to at least 2030 because the UK faces “a dangerous gap” in
power supplies if they shut.

Both have already been operating for 42 years
despite being scheduled to close for safety reasons in 2008. EDF,
France’s state-owned power utility, which operates all five UK nuclear
stations, said it was working to keep the stations operational without
compromising safety. Mark Hartley, from EDF, said: “In November, the UK
Government said that the retirement of these Advanced Gas-Cooled Reactors
(AGRs) risks leaving a dangerous gap in Britain’s low-carbon energy
supply. “It is our ambition to generate from the remaining AGR stations
for as long as it is safe and commercially viable to do so, and we will
keep their lifetimes under review to assess whether further life extensions
can be achieved.”

Sizewell B, the UK’s largest nuclear plant, is
already due to operate until 2035, and EDF hopes to extend this to 2055.
Two other stations, Torness and Heysham 2, were originally scheduled to
close in 2023 and have been cleared to generate until March 2030 after EDF
invested £8.6bn in the fleet.

The fate of Heysham 1 and Hartlepool is less
certain and will depend on the results of safety assessments. AGR reactors
contain radioactive uranium fuel pellets surrounded by massive graphite
blocks that absorb the high-energy neutrons emitted by the fuel, thereby
controlling the nuclear reaction.

However, over time, these blocks tend to
crack due to the intense radiation and heat to which they are exposed. Such
cracks have already forced the closure of several other UK power stations.
EDF’s safety assessment will need to be ratified by the Office for
Nuclear Regulation, which will need to approve the extensions as safe.

 Telegraph 21st Jan 2026, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2026/01/21/britain-extend-life-ageing-nuclear-plants-keep-lights-on/

January 22, 2026 Posted by | safety, UK | Leave a comment

Chernobyl cooling systems have lost power but meltdown risk is low

An electrical outage at Chernobyl nuclear power plant risks dangerous fuel overheating, but experts say that the chances are extremely slim due to the age of the reactors, which were shut down over two decades ago

New Scientist, By Matthew Sparkes, 20 January 2026

An electrical outage at Ukraine’s Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant has taken spent fuel cooling systems offline, leading to a potential risk of overheating and the release of dangerous levels of radiation – but due to the age of the fuel, it should be safe until power is restored.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reports that several Ukrainian electrical substations have been hit by Russian military strikes, causing power outages at Chernobyl. “The IAEA is actively following developments in order to assess impact on nuclear safety,” wrote IAEA director general Rafael Grossi in a post on X.

Spent nuclear fuel from reactors continues to emit radiation for years, creating heat that must be shed, or else the fuel can melt and emit a spike of dangerous radiation. The fuel from Chernobyl’s former reactors is stored in a large cooling pond that is constantly replenished with fresh, cold water to keep its temperature down.

But without an electricity supply – which the IAEA says the site now lacks – this cooling has stopped, which will allow the water temperature to rise and increase the rate of evaporation.

“When the fuel comes out of a reactor, it will be hot for a while, because there will be fission products and there will be radioactive and giving off gammas and betas and alphas – just emitting energy, which needs to be removed, otherwise it will eventually melt,” says Paul Cosgrove at the University of Cambridge.

Working in Chernobyl’s favour, however, is that its stored fuel is older and therefore has already had time to emit much of its radioactive energy and cool down. The risk now is lower than the risk was in 2022, for example, when New Scientist reported on similar power outages at Chernobyl.

“It is always a worry when a nuclear site loses power, but worry about nuclear risks is often several orders of magnitude above the risks associated with other events with similar consequences,” says Ian Farnan, also at Cambridge.

Chernobyl’s reactor 4 exploded in 1986, but reactor 2 was shut down in 1991, reactor 1 ceased generating power in 1996 and reactor 3 – the final one at the site – was decommissioned in 2000.

The exact specifications of the storage pools that contain the fuel left over from those reactors at Chernobyl are kept classified, says Cosgrove. But he is aware of an inspection by regulators in 2022, which found that the risk of spent fuel overheating in the case of a power outage was low. “This fuel has been sat in there for 20 years, so it will have decayed. More and more of that energy will be gone,” he says………………. https://www.newscientist.com/article/2512468-chernobyl-cooling-systems-have-lost-power-but-meltdown-risk-is-low/

January 22, 2026 Posted by | safety, Ukraine | 1 Comment

IAEA chief says nuclear accident risk in Ukraine outweighs fear of atomic weapons.

Rafael Grossi says fighting around Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant has left Europe’s largest facility in ‘extremely fragile, volatile condition’ –

Beyza Binnur Donmez  |16.01.2026 GENEVA, https://www.aa.com.tr/en/russia-ukraine-war/iaea-chief-says-nuclear-accident-risk-in-ukraine-outweighs-fear-of-atomic-weapons/3801135

The head of the UN nuclear watchdog said he is more worried about the risk of a nuclear accident in Ukraine than the potential use of atomic weapons, stressing the fragile situation at Europe’s largest nuclear power plant.

In an interview published on Friday, International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Grossi told RTVE that while the possibility of nuclear weapons being used in the Ukraine war cannot be fully ruled out, it remains unlikely.

“I believe that the possibility of the use of nuclear weapons in the context of this conflict is not very high,” Grossi said. “Therefore, we are immediately more concerned about the possibility of a nuclear accident than about the use of the nuclear weapon itself.”

Grossi underlined the dangers surrounding the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, which he described as “the most important nuclear power plant in Europe,” noting that it once supplied 20% of Ukraine’s electricity. The plant, located in a combat zone and occupied by Russia, remains highly vulnerable to military activity and power outages that could disrupt cooling systems.

“The situation today is extremely fragile. It is a combat zone,” he said, adding: “We are exercising this function of permanent observation and mediating between both belligerents to achieve, for example, specific ceasefires. We have already successfully negotiated four that allow us to carry out, for example, repairs on the high voltage lines that surround the plant, in order to precisely avoid radiological emergency situations.”

“It is an extremely fragile and volatile situation that we follow day by day,” he stressed.

Iran holds ‘significant amount’ of enriched uranium

Turning to Iran, Grossi said the country continues to hold a “significant amount” of highly enriched uranium, amid tensions and suspended inspections following attacks on nuclear facilities.

“There is still a significant amount of uranium enriched to 60% isotopic purity in Iran, which is practically the level required for the manufacture of nuclear weapons,” he said.

Grossi also warned against any Iranian move to withdraw from the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, saying: “This would only aggravate the situation of tension that is already being experienced.”

To a question, the IAEA chief said the agency remains engaged in dialogue with Tehran and other key actors, including the US, to restore monitoring and prevent further escalation.

January 21, 2026 Posted by | safety, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Ukraine and Russia agree temporary ceasefire to allow repairs to Zaporizhzhia nuclear power line.

The IAEA director warned that attacks on Ukraine’s power infrastructure have “direct implications on the nuclear safety of its nuclear facilities”.

Mirror UK, Emma O’Neill Content Editor, 16 Jan 2026

Ukraine and Russia have agreed a temporary ceasefire to allow urgent repair work on a damaged power line at Europe’s largest nuclear plant, the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP), IAEA officials confirmed today……….

The 330 kV backup line was disconnected on 2 January during military activity, leaving the plant reliant on a single 750 kV main power line. Technicians from Ukraine’s electrical grid operator are expected to begin repairs under the short-term truce in the coming days.

An IAEA team has departed Vienna to travel to the frontline and monitor the work, ensuring that safety measures are strictly followed during the repairs.

The agency confirmed that winter protection measures are in place at the plant, including temperature controls to prevent freezing in groundwater wells that supply cooling systems for reactors and spent fuel pools. Emergency diesel generators are also fully operational should the plant lose off-site power again.

The situation highlights the ongoing risks to Ukraine’s nuclear facilities, with military activity recently damaging a substation at the Chernobyl plant and forcing temporary power reductions at other sites.

Grossi warned that attacks on Ukraine’s power infrastructure have “direct implications on the nuclear safety of its nuclear facilities” and announced plans for another IAEA mission to assess 10 critical substations supplying electricity for reactor cooling systems and safety equipment.

Over the past week, IAEA teams reported air raid alarms and military activity near all five nuclear sites in Ukraine, including explosions and flying objects close to Zaporizhzhia, Khmelnitsky, South Ukraine, and Chernobyl plants.

The temporary ceasefire now allows repairs to the ZNPP backup line to go ahead, providing a vital safeguard for Europe’s largest nuclear facility and reducing the risk of a serious nuclear incident. https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/ukraine-russia-agree-temporary-ceasefire-36566368

January 21, 2026 Posted by | safety, Ukraine | Leave a comment

TEPCO postpones 1st reactor restart since Fukushima due to alarm trouble.

January 19, 2026 (Mainichi Japan), https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20260119/p2g/00m/0bu/023000c

TOKYO (Kyodo) — Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc. said Monday it will postpone until an unspecified date the restart of its nuclear reactor northwest of Tokyo — its first since the 2011 Fukushima disaster — due to a control-rod alarm failure.

The Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear complex in Niigata Prefecture was initially set to restart on Tuesday, but an alarm designed to sound when two non-paired control rods are withdrawn from the reactor fuel core failed to trigger during a test Saturday, the utility said at a press conference.

The company said it will announce a new date for restarting the No. 6 unit of the nuclear power complex.

After the latest incident, which was deemed a deviation from operational limits stipulated in the plant’s safety regulations, TEPCO returned all control rods to the fully inserted position.

The cause of the error was determined to be an incorrect control rod pairing that had persisted since the No. 6 unit began commercial operation in November 1996.

According to TEPCO, investigations since Saturday revealed that 88 of approximately 20,000 control rod pairs had configuration errors. The incorrect pairings had not been discovered until now because alarm tests are conducted at random.

Yutaka Kikukawa, unit director at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant, denied that any mistakes were made by operational staff, saying, “We will do what needs to be done to correct the error discovered by chance.”

The configuration errors have since been corrected, and the plant was returned to its pre-deviation state Sunday night, TEPCO said.

The rescheduling came as it will take several days for the operator to conduct verification checks on each of the 205 control rods at the No. 6 reactor and examine the fission reaction of the fuel assemblies.

The reactors at the seven-unit complex have been offline since the No. 6 unit entered regular inspection in March 2012.

January 20, 2026 Posted by | Japan, safety | Leave a comment

All the president’s yes-men?

   by beyondnuclearinternational

The NRC commission looks poised to rubber-stamp “Cowboy Chernobyl”, write Paul Gunter and Linda Pentz Gunter

Donald Trump loves a yes-man. What we are now waiting to learn is just how many of those yes-men are sitting on the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC).

The agency was ordered late last year by the then White House and Elon Musk-created US Department of Government Efficiency, to effectively accelerate and “rubber stamp” reactor license approvals in order to fulfill the White House’s reckless directive, contained in four executive orders issued last May, to license new reactors at lighting speed.

On December 1, the NRC proudly announced that its staff had completed their final safety evaluation for the Bill Gates company TerraPower’s small modular reactor design in record time, in keeping with the make haste mandate from the White House. The NRC staff had concluded that “there are no safety aspects that would preclude issuing the construction permit.”

NRC commissioner David Wright was abruptly and surprisingly demoted from his position as chairman after serving in that capacity for less than one year.

Jeremy Groom, acting director of the NRC’s Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation, even bragged how the NRC staff “finished our technical work on the Kemmerer review a month ahead of our already accelerated schedule, as we aim to make licensing decisions for new, advanced reactors in no more than 18 months.”

What we are now waiting to find out, likely sometime this month, is whether the five NRC commissioners will indeed grant a construction license to a patently dangerous reactor design (we are using the term “dangerous” here under their own definition since all of us already know that every nuclear reactor design is inherently dangerous and the so-called new ones haven’t changed that reality.)

Who will be calling those shots, however, has now been significantly reshuffled by the Trump administration. 

Sitting NRC commissioner and Republican David Wright had been appointed commission chair immediately after Trump’s January 2025 inauguration, bumping the Biden administration’s appointed chair, Democrat Christopher Hanson, to commissioner. 

By June, the White House had unceremoniously fired Hanson from the commission “without cause” in a move widely viewed as illegal based on US Supreme Court precedent case law that went unchallenged. By August, Republican commissioner Annie Caputo had resigned, a surprise move explained by the need to “spend more time with family,” invariable a convenient cover story. This left two vacant seats on the commission.

These have now been filled by two Republicans nominated by the White House — Douglas Weaver (straight from industry) and Ho Nieh, who has been spinning through industry-regulator revolving doors for much of his career.

Nieh has been an NRC employee for 23 years, reaching senior management level. He was confirmed to the commission by the US Senate on November 19, 2025 and sworn in on December 4, 2025. 

Then, in yet another surprise move, on January 8, 2026, Trump named Ho Nieh the new NRC commission chairman, effective immediately, bumping David Wright back to commissioner. Caputo’s vacant seat was filled by Weaver.

This was a strategic political maneuver to set up a 3-2 Republican majority on the commission, with the Democrats — Bradley Crowell (term expiring June 30, 2027) and Matthew Marzano (term expiring June 30, 2028 — now pushed to the minority………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

The witnesses for the House hearing — tellingly called “American Energy Dominance: Dawn of the New Nuclear Era” — came exclusively from the industry, with representatives from the Nuclear Energy Institute — the nuclear industry’s paid propaganda arm — and from Southern Company, the Nuclear Innovation Alliance and the Idaho National Laboratory.

Entirely missing were any contrary, independent, objective and scientifically knowledgeable voices. Did they invite Lyman or M.V. Ramana, or Arjun Makhijani, physicists who actually understand how precisely dangerous these new reactor schemes are?

Did they invite Amory Lovins to blow the lid off the extreme costs or Mark Jacobson to educate them on how they could achieve their same goals with renewables instead?

And did they invite anyone from the targeted communities to see if they actually wanted these things in their neighborhoods or had even been consulted?

Even the right wing British daily newspaper, the Daily Mail, ran a headline that screamed “Tiny city of just 2,000 residents are fearful as Bill Gates-backed nuclear plant dubbed ‘Cowboy Chernobyl is built on their doorstep,” borrowing the moniker Lyman had used for the Natrium plan.

“I don’t think there are, at least from our perspective, many communities that are out there raising their hands saying, ‘Yes. We want a nuclear project in our community with an expedited safety and environmental review,’” John Burrows, Wyoming Outdoor Council’s energy and climate policy director told his local NPR station. “It’s just not something that any community wants to see, especially for a pilot or demonstration project.”

At least 60 percent of Americans now say they want more nuclear power according to a recent Pew Research Center poll. Of course they do, because they, like members of Congress, are only listening to the endless propaganda drumbeat from the nuclear industry, blasted non-stop across mainstream media and almost always without challenge.

Lyman’s “Cowboy Chernobyl” quip is actually a deep serious warning. It’s time we drove those nuclear cowboys off into the sunset, not in glory but in disgrace.

Paul Gunter is the Director of the Reactor Oversight Project at Beyond Nuclear. Linda Pentz Gunter is the founder of Beyond Nuclear and serves as its international specialist. Her book, No To Nuclear. Why Nuclear Power Destroys Lives, Derails Climate Progress and Provokes War, can be pre-ordered now from Pluto Press. https://beyondnuclearinternational.org/2026/01/15/all-the-presidents-yes-men/

January 20, 2026 Posted by | safety, USA | Leave a comment

Chubu Electric to Face On-Site Probe over N-Plant Data Fraud

Tokyo, Jan. 14 (Jiji Press) https://jen.jiji.com/jc/eng?g=eco&k=2026011400579—

Japan’s Nuclear Regulation Authority decided Wednesday that its secretariat will conduct an on-site inspection of Chubu Electric Power Co. over the company’s data fraud regarding earthquake risks at its Hamaoka nuclear power plant.
   The inspection is expected to target Chubu Electric’s headquarters in the central Japan city of Nagoya. The power plant located in the central prefecture of Shizuoka may be subject to the probe if necessary.


   Also at the day’s regular meeting, the nuclear watchdog approved the scrapping of its screening of the power plant for a possible restart, in the wake of the data scandal.
   In addition, the NRA will issue an order for Chubu Electric to report back on the details of the data fraud under the nuclear reactor regulation law, with the deadline set for the end of March. The company will face punishment if it refuses the order or makes false statements.
   The authority plans to urge other power companies to prepare appropriate documents for the NRA’s reactor screenings.

January 18, 2026 Posted by | Japan, safety | Leave a comment

Bill Gates-backed ‘Cowboy Chernobyl’ nuclear reactor races toward approval in Wyoming

For longtime Wyoming resident Steve Helling, the risks outweigh the promises.

“Wyoming is being used as a guinea pig for this nuclear experiment,”

By Samantha Olander, Jan. 10, 2026

A Bill Gates-backed nuclear reactor dubbed “Cowboy Chernobyl” by critics is barreling toward approval in rural Wyoming, alarming residents and nuclear safety experts as regulators fast-track the project under a Trump-era order.

TerraPower, founded by the Microsoft guru, is seeking federal approval to build the western hemisphere’s first Natrium nuclear reactor in Kemmerer, a coal town of roughly 2,000 people near the Utah border and about two hours north of Salt Lake City.

The plant would use liquid sodium rather than water to cool the reactor, a design pitched as safer and more efficient. 

Critics say it introduces new risks while cutting corners on containment.

The United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission completed its final safety evaluation in December, concluding there were no issues that would block issuance of a construction permit.

The five-member commission is expected to vote on the permit later this month. TerraPower still needs a separate operating license before the reactor can run.

Local residents say the fast pace has left them uneasy.

“We’re probably two hours away from that place when it comes to how long it takes the wind to get here,” Patrick Lawien of Casper told the Daily Mail. “Obviously, if anything goes wrong, it’s headed straight for us.”

TerraPower began building the non-nuclear portion of the 44-acre site in June 2024, near the retired Naughton coal plant, which shut down at the end of 2025.

The company says the reactor will generate 345 megawatts of power, with the ability to reach 500 megawatts during peak demand. It aims to have the plant operating by 2030………………………………………

uclear watchdogs say speed is the problem.

The Union of Concerned Scientists, a nonprofit science advocacy group, says TerraPower’s design omits the traditional concrete containment structure used at U.S. nuclear plants. 

The company instead proposes “functional containment,” which relies on internal engineered systems to perform containment functions rather than a physical containment building.

“The potential for rapid power excursions and the lack of a real containment make the Kemmerer plant a true ‘Cowboy Chernobyl,’” said Edwin Lyman, the group’s director of nuclear power safety.

Lyman warned that if containment proves inadequate later, it would be nearly impossible to add a traditional containment structure once construction begins. 

He also criticized the sodium cooling system.

“Its liquid sodium coolant can catch fire, and the reactor has inherent instabilities that could lead to a rapid and uncontrolled increase in power,” Lyman said….

Concerns intensified after the NRC wrapped up its review months ahead of its original schedule.

The accelerated timeline followed an executive order signed by Donald Trump in May directing federal agencies to fast-track advanced nuclear reactor approvals,

TerraPower applied for its construction permit in March 2024 and received preliminary approval in December, well ahead of its initial August 2026 target.

For longtime Wyoming resident Steve Helling, the risks outweigh the promises.

“Wyoming is being used as a guinea pig for this nuclear experiment,” Helling told the Daily Mail. “Wyoming has everything I could want, beauty, clean air, clean water, wildlife, abundant natural resources.”

He said he worries about the long-term cost of disposing of nuclear waste decades down the road, as the U.S. still lacks a permanent storage solution.

Some states, including California and Connecticut, prohibit new nuclear plant construction unless the federal government establishes a long-term solution for radioactive waste storage.

January 16, 2026 Posted by | safety, USA | Leave a comment

Watchdog halts nuclear plant safety review after seismic data found to be fabricated

Japan’s nuclear watchdog is scrapping the safety screening for two reactors at the Hamaoka nuclear power plant

ByMARI YAMAGUCHI Associated Press, January 7, 2026,

TOKYO — Japan’s nuclear watchdog said Wednesday it is scrapping the safety screening for two reactors at the Hamaoka nuclear power plant in central Japan after the plant’s operator was found to have fabricated data about earthquake risks, in a setback to Japan’s attempts to accelerate reactor restarts to boost nuclear energy use.

Chubu Electric Power Co. had applied for safety screening to resume operations at the No. 3 and 4 reactors at the Hamaoka nuclear power plant in 2014 and 2015. Two other reactors at the plant are being decommissioned, and a fifth is idle.

The plant, about 200 kilometers (125 miles) west of Tokyo, is located on a coastal area known for potential risks from so-called Nankai Trough megaquakes.

The Nuclear Regulation Authority said it started an internal investigation in February after receiving a tip from a whistleblower that the utility had for years provided fabricated data that underestimated potential seismic risks.

The regulator suspended the screening for the reactors after it confirmed the falsification and the utility acknowledged the fabrication in mid-December, said Shinsuke Yamanaka, the watchdog’s chair. The NRA is also considering inspecting the utility headquarters.

“Ensuring safety is the first and foremost responsibility for nuclear plant operators and (data fabrication) is an act of betrayal to their task and one that destroys nuclear safety,” Yamanaka said.

The scandal surfaced Monday when Chubu Electric President Kingo Hayashi acknowledged that workers at the utility used inappropriate seismic data with an alleged intention to underestimate seismic risks and apologized. He pledged to establish an independent panel for investigation.

The screening, including data that had been approved earlier, would have to start from scratch or possibly be rejected entirely, Yamanaka said.

The move is a setback at a time Japan’s government seeks to accelerate reactor restarts to cope with rising energy costs and pressure to reduce carbon emissions.

Public opinion in Japan remains divided due to lingering safety concerns after the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi meltdowns.

January 12, 2026 Posted by | safety | 3 Comments

Japan’s ‘most dangerous’ nuclear power plant admits to manipulating earthquake safety data

Regulator halts review to restart Hamaoka power plant after 14 years

Shweta Sharma, Tuesday 06 January 2026, https://www.independent.co.uk/asia/japan/japan-nuclear-plant-data-manipulation-earthquake-b2895086.html

A Japanese power plant operator has admitted to cherry-picking critical safety data to pass the screening process of the nuclear safety regulator to restart two of its offline reactors.

Chubu Electric said on Monday that it had set up an independent panel of experts to investigate possible misconduct in compiling data as part of a process to restart two reactors at the Hamaoka nuclear power plant.

The plant originally had five reactors but two were permanently shut down in 2009. The remaining three reactors were taken offline in the wake of the 2011 Fukushima disaster.

Concerns about data manipulation mean the power plant is unlikely to restart anytime soon. It’s also a likely setback for Japan’s efforts to shift back to nuclear power to boost energy security and cut greenhouse gas emissions.

Chubu told regulators it had selected an earthquake wave model closest to the average of 20 possible patterns to calculate the Hamaoka plant’s “standard seismic motion”, the maximum shaking the reactors could withstand. However, the company admitted, employees in charge could have deliberately chosen that model to make the plant appear safer and speed up the screening process.

We sincerely apologise for the incident,” Chubu Electric president Kingo Hayashi told a press conference. “The actions could potentially shake the foundations of the nuclear power business.”

The regulator learned about the misconduct last February after it was contacted by a whistleblower.

A senior agency executive called the matter “unbelievable” saying it broke trust in the operator and would make the people question its eligibility.

The industry ministry has now ordered Chubu Electric to submit a detailed report by 6 April explaining the cause of the misconduct and outlining measures to prevent it from happening again.

The Hamaoka power plant, 200km south-west of Tokyo, has been described as the “world’s most dangerous” nuclear power facility by some seismologists and anti‑nuclear campaigners. Government forecasts have predicted an 87 per cent chance of a powerful quake in the area, which sits on two major subterranean faults. A major accident would be likely to force the evacuation of Greater Tokyo, home to 28 million people.

Professor Katsuhiko Ishibashi, a seismologist and a former member of a Japanese government panel on nuclear reactor safety, said in 2003 that Hamaoka was “the most dangerous nuclear power station” in Japan because of the potential for an earthquake to trigger a nuclear disaster.

He assessed at the time that such an incident would devastate a broad area between Tokyo and Nagoya, destroying more than 200,000 buildings and resulting in a huge tsunami.

The plant was ordered to shut down reactors 4 and 5 and cancel the planned restart of reactor 3 following the Fukushima disaster, when a magnitude 9 earthquake triggered tsunami waves up to 15m high. Hamaoka was built to withstand only an 8.5-magnitude quake and an 8m tsunami.

Chubu applied for a review to restart the Hamaoka reactors between 2014 and 2015, and it was approved for standard seismic motion in September 2023.

Shares of Chubu Electric dropped 8.2 per cent, its steepest fall since April 2025, after the latest revelations.

January 9, 2026 Posted by | Japan, safety | Leave a comment

New roads police team for major construction work

Alice Cunningham, BBC 4th Jan 2026, Suffolk

A police force is hiring a road team to escort abnormal loads heading to and from nationally significant infrastructure projects such as Sizewell C nuclear power station.

Suffolk Police said it was recruiting a designated abnormal indivisible loads (AIL) team that would consist of police motorcyclists.

It envisaged the team would work with several projects for several years, and noted that its current project with the new Sizewell C nuclear plant near Leiston was for 12 years.

Chief Constable Rachel Kearton said the “uplift required to support the policing element of the Sizewell C development has been secured through the planning process and paid for by the Sizewell C developer”……………………a “carefully co-ordinated roads policing provision” was in place to ensure safe movement of the abnormal loads to and from Sizewell.

The UK government, which is the largest shareholder in Sizewell C Limited, is building a new two-reactor nuclear power station on the coast next to the Sizewell A and B sites, that could power the equivalent of about six million homes and will generate electricity for 60 years.

Permission for the project was granted in July 2022 before the government gave its final funding approval last year…………………. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cddg773172jo

January 8, 2026 Posted by | safety, UK | Leave a comment

Safety fears as Japan prepares to restart nuclear plant ‘built on tofu’

the greatest risk remains the region’s susceptibility to seismic activity.

the will of the majority of residents today is opposition to a restart and that opposition is f

While Fukushima operator Tepco says it is ‘committed to safety’ at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa, critics believe it is a disaster waiting to happen.

Julian Ryall, 27 Dec 2025

Campaigners against nuclear energy have condemned Japan’s decision to resume operations at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa power plant, claiming that the facility will be unable to withstand a major earthquake as it was “built on tofu”.

Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco), the operator of the Niigata prefecture plant, on Wednesday applied for a final examination of the facility to the Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA). Approval is likely to be a formality as the prefectural assembly already gave the nod on Tuesday.

Tepco, which has been fiercely criticised for its handling of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant disaster in March 2011, intends to restart one reactor at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa on January 20.

It would be the first of Tepco’s nuclear reactors to resume since three of Fukushima’s six reactors melted down after a magnitude 9 offshore earthquake unleashed devastating tsunamis.

Tepco has been working hard in recent years to convince the local government and residents of Niigata prefecture that it has made upgrades to secure the site from natural disasters.

Its president, Tomoaki Kobayakawa, told the media that as the operator “responsible” for the Fukushima accident, the company was now “committed to prioritising safety” at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa.

Many people remain unconvinced.

“The plant was famous for having been built on tofu – the bedrock is 30 metres (100 feet) below the surface – with many fault lines running through the site as well as offshore,” said Shaun Burnie, senior nuclear energy specialist for Greenpeace.

“Kashiwazaki-Kariwa is one of the world’s largest nuclear plants and the only one in theory capable of operating for Tepco. So restarting operations has been a priority for both the company and the government for more than a decade,” Burnie told This Week in Asia.

“But resistance from Niigata residents, the scale of safety issues and the incompetence of Tepco have undermined all efforts until now.”

History repeating itself?

Nearly 15 years after the Fukushima plant was the site of the second-worst nuclear accident in global history, Burnie warns that serious problems are being overlooked again.

Even during the preliminary planning stages, in the mid-1970s, it was apparent that ground conditions at the site by the Sea of Japan were not suitable, he said.

That was shown in July 2007, when the Chuetsu-oki earthquake struck. The magnitude 6.6 quake occurred on a previously unknown offshore fault line about 11km (7 miles) off the coast, followed 13 hours later by a 6.8 tremor around 330km (205 miles) to the west.

The nuclear plant, 19km (12 miles) due south from the epicentre of the initial quake, registered a peak ground acceleration – essentially how much the ground shook – of 6.8 metres (22 feet) per second squared in reactor No 1. The design specification for achieving a safe shutdown is 4.5m/s², while the restart level for key equipment in the plant is 2.73m/s².

Burnie said the original design specifications at the site “turned out to be gross underestimates”, with the quakes causing damage of varying degrees at 3,000 places within the plant.

A fire in an electric transformer caused the most serious damage. It left a pall of black smoke over the plant and alarmed local residents. There were also a number of leaks of mildly radioactive water and spills of radioactive cobalt-60, iodine and chromium-51 from overturned storage drums.

Given the events of 2007 and 2011, Burnie said local residents’ concerns were justified, particularly as new issues have come to light.

“We should have no confidence in Tepco assurances on safety at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa,” he said. “For example, two months after the NRA had approved the reactors’ basic safety assessment in late 2017, Tepco revealed that … the site under the emergency hydrogen ventilation buildings at units five, six and seven was vulnerable to liquefaction.”

Tepco “immediately came under pressure to explain the scale of liquefaction at the site, prove that it does not extend to the reactor buildings and how it was that the NRA was not informed prior to granting approval”, Burnie said.

Equally, he said, the NRA had to explain how it failed to identify liquefaction as a problem for a site before it granted basic safety approval.

A series of security incidents have also been cause for concern. There have been accusations of poor handling of sensitive documents, malfunctioning intruder detection systems and an employee borrowing a colleague’s pass to enter the restricted main control room in 2020.

Shaken by fears

But the greatest risk remains the region’s susceptibility to seismic activity.

“There are multiple seismic fault lines in the area of the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa site, including large-scale submarine active faults,” Burnie said. “The enormous seismic risks at the site remain unresolved and are certain to dominate the debate about the safety of any reactor restart, including in ongoing legal challenges.”

In a statement issued on Tuesday, Tepco said it would “carefully cooperate with all inspections performed by the NRA while also continuing to prioritise safety and steadily making each and every preparation for a restart”.

Takeshi Sakagami, a member of the Citizens’ Association for Monitoring Nuclear Regulation, said that a recent survey conducted by Niigata prefecture determined that 60 per cent of local residents believed that “conditions are not right” to resume operations at the plant.

“The governor explained that support should increase as understanding deepens,” Sakagami said. But “opponents counter that the will of the majority of residents today is opposition to a restart and that opposition is firm”.

Sakagami believed the government was hastening to restart the reactors “because they fear that Japan’s nuclear technology will fall behind the rest of the world”.

For him, the direction that Japan should take is simple.

“I believe Japan should abandon nuclear power and boldly shift towards renewable energy sources and energy conservation,” he said.

January 1, 2026 Posted by | Japan, safety | Leave a comment

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