Nuclear Hotseat

By Libbe HaLevyNews

Nuclear Hotseat episodes

May 15, 2019 Nuclear Divestment Campaign takes $$$ Out of Nuke Weapons Manufacturing
Nuclear divestment means institutional nuke investments are going down — and Susi Snyder explains how any one of us can join the movement. She is project lead for the PAX No Nukes Project and coordinator for the Don’t Bank on the Bomb research and campaign. She’s an expert on nuclear weapons, with over two decades of experience working at the intersect between nuclear weapons and human rights.
Eric Epstein is the Executive Director of Three Mile Island Alert, and has been active in the movement for over 40 years. He explains the failed bailout and what’s next in dealing with the highly radioactive waste.
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May 09, 2019NH #411: Indigenous Nuclear Genocide: Uranium Mining on Native Lands w/International Activists Candyce Paul, Leona Morgan, Ashish Birulee
Indigenous Nuclear activists (clockwise from upper left) Candyce Paul, webinar producers from the UK's Stop New Nuclear, Ashish Birulee, and Leona Morgan
This Week's Featured Speakers:
Indigenous Nuclear Genocide: The start of the nuclear fuel chain is uranium mining, the weight of which comes down disproportionately on indigenous people, the poor and/or people of color This week's Nuclear Hotseat features excerpts from a webinar produced on May 4, 2019, by Stop New Nuclear in the UK and moderated by Nikki Clark. Participants featured on today's show are:
Candyce Paul is an artist and activist of the English River First Nations in Northern Saskatchewan, Canada. She works with the group Committee for Future Generations, and talks here about uranium mining and waste burial issues being pushed in what is perceived as being pristine forests and lands in far northern Canada... when it's all being contaminated by the nuclear fuel chain. Other groups dealing with these issues include: Say NO to Nuclear in Northern Saskatchewan and First Nations Say ENOUGH.
Leona Morgan is of the Dineh people, what the western world thinks of as the Navajo people of Arizona and New Mexico. She works with many groups, most recently Halt Holtec, against the proposed so-called "interim" high level nuclear waste dumps being pushed onto New Mexico.
Navajo Birth Cohort Study LINK.
At one point in her presentation Leona refers to a map:
Ashish Birulee is of the traditional Adavasi people from Jarkhand in India. You can follow his work at Jhakhandi Organization Against Radiation. Here are links to his writing:

‘I’ve Seen My Own Relatives Die Of Radiation’: Life As An Activist’s Son In Jadugoda
Jadugoda: Drowning in Nuclear Greed
Numnutz of the Week (for Outstanding Nuclear Boneheadedness):
A plutonium implosion test leaks radiation, takes weeks to clean up, IDs cracks in the vessel's fastener washers... but brags about keeping to schedule, DOESN'T do more than inspect the vessel visually, and wow, look at that test data! The nuclear industry and those who inhabit it must be out of their minds.
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May 08, 2019 Indigenous Nuclear Genocide: Uranium Mining on Native Lands
Featuring: International Indigenous Activists Candyce Paul of English River First Nations in Northern Saskatchewan; Leona Morgan of the Dineh people, what the western world thinks of as the Navajo people of Arizona and New Mexico; and Ashish Birulee of the traditional Adavasi people from Jarkhand in India.
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May 02, 2019NH #410: Chernobyl #3: Harrowing Play-by-Play of an Ultimate Nuclear Disaster - Author Adam Higginbotham
Chernobyl play-by-play of how the disaster happened: new book by Adam Higginbotham
This Week's Featured Interview:
Adam Higginbotham is the author of MIDNIGHT IN CHERNOBYL: The Untold Story of the World’s Greatest Nuclear Disaster, the first complete account of the catastrophe that encircled the world and helped precipitate the fall of the Soviet Union. Higginbotham draws upon recently declassified documents, letters, unpublished memoirs and material from the archives of the Chernobyl Museum in Kiev, as well as scores of original interviews with participants in the events of 1986. The book reads like a thriller, with identifiable characters, arcs of action or inaction, good guys, bad guys, dupes, government corruption, and international politics. It is almost a great book. But as you will hear, he and I also have a complete variance of opinion when it comes to his conclusions as to Chernobyl’s ultimate impact on the world.
Numnutz of the Week (for Outstanding Nuclear Boneheadedness):
Radioactive beer? OK, so it might give me internal contamination - but how does it taste?
Activist Links:
States are Using Tapayer Money to Greenwash Dirty Nuclear Power - New Republic by Linda Pentz Gunter
LINK to copy of full-page ad in the Hill Times by 24 Canadian environmental watchdog groups bringing up "grave concerns" about the handling of Canada's federally-owned nuclear wastes by a multinational consortium that includes companies and corporate partners, "some of which have faced criminal charges."
Stop New Nuclear in the UK at their World Record Breaking Nuclear Waste Barrel Connectivity event at Surround Springfields!
1 hr
May 01, 2019 Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster Play-by-Play in Flawed New Book
Chernobyl Nuclear disaster explored in Midnight in Chernobyl - extensively researched play-by-play recreation of design failures, human error, radiation devastation, political cover-ups, destroyed lives in flawed new book by Adam Higginbotham.
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April 25, 2019NH #409: Chernobyl Radiation Cover-Ups & Deadly Truth: Kate Brown, author, Manual for Survival
Chernobyl radiation impact on a father and son
This Week's Featured Interview:
Chernobyl Radiation's true health impact revealed: A very special interview with Kate Brown, author of Manual for Survival: A Chernobyl Guide to the Future. She is an historian of environmental and nuclear history at MIT and the author of the Plutopia, which won seven awards. She did research on the ground in eastern Europe, through 27 medical archives, to piece together the story of how Chernobyl's radiation impacted and continues to harm the health of people and the environment in Eastern Europe and far beyond. Breathtaking in her clarity, precision... and the info. Not to be missed!
Kate Brown's book is available at most bookstores.
Numnutz of the Week (for Outstanding Nuclear Boneheadedness):
In a so-called "limited" nuclear war, "only" 1% of the world's population would be killed - a mere 76 MILLION PEOPLE -- so of course, in the face of such horror and devastation, it's only natural that people would think immediately of protecting... their investment portfolios! Here's the LINK to the article. (Shocking to think this came from the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. You'd think they would be able to focus on the science, the health devastation, the destructio of climate, crops, the crumbling of society - do they actually think they'll be able to keep "civilization" together after a nuclear war, even a so-called "limited" one? "Numnutz" is too weak a term to cover that eventuality.)
Action Links:
Kate Brown's article, Chernobyl’s disastrous cover-up is a warning for the next nuclear age
Why the financial community should work to prevent the market and economic shocks of a nuclear incident
Harvey Wasserman's "America's "Hole-in-the-Head" Nuke Suicide Pact Gets Court Approval"
Excellent article: "How nuclear plants are gaming climate-change rules"
Beyond Nuclear International's "Chernobyl Children in a Havana Hospital" - film
Nuclear power is not a viable solution for Green New Deal
HOW TO DISMANTLE A NUCLEAR BOMB
How to Dismantle a Nuclear Bomb from Outrider Foundation
1 hr
April 24, 2019 Chernobyl Radiation's Deadly Legacy & Nuke Industry Cover-Up
#Chernobyl #Radiation cover-up exploded by Kate Brown in Manual for Survival. Research from 27 Eastern European medical archives reveals devastating, ongoing health impact & nails #Nuclear industry playbook of how they covered their tracks.
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April 17, 2019 NH #408: Chernobyl 33 Anniversary SPECIAL #1 – Yablakov, Mousseau, Survivor Kouneva, More!
Chernobyl at 33: The melted, still highly radioactive nuclear fuel at the bottom of Chernobyl, nicknamed the “elephant’s foot.” Listen Here: [powerpress] The Chernobyl nuclear disaster marks its 33rd anniversary on April 26, and Nuclear Hotseat marks it with two SPECIAL reports on the accident and its aftermath. This week’s episode features interviews with a...
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April 16, 2019 Chernobyl at 33 Anniversary SPECIAL #1
The Chernobyl nuclear disaster marks its 33rd anniversary on April 26, and Nuclear Hotseat marks it with two SPECIAL reports on the accident and its aftermath. This week’s episode features interviews with a Chernobyl survivor; the man behind the keystone book on the disaster and the doctor who edited it; the world’s premiere on-the-ground evolutionary biologist investigating mutations, and a photojournalist who makes the Chernobyl/Fukushima connection. It bring Ukraine’s devastating 1986 nuclear accident — and its ongoing consequences — into sharp, terrifying, and very personal focus.
This Week’s Special Interviews:
Bonnie Kouneva was a 16-year-old living in Bulgaria when the Chernobyl accident started on April 26, 1986. She was outdoors in the rain all day at a rally and got hit with the radiation plume. Bonnie talks about Chernobyl’s impact on her life and the health of her children. This former mountaineer and Bulgarian Greenpeace member currently lives in the United States.
Dr. Timothy Mousseau is an evolutionary biologist and faculty member of the Department of Biological Sciences at the University of South Carolina. Since 1999, Professor Mousseau and his collaborators have explored the ecological, genetic and evolutionary consequences of low-dose radiation in populations of plants, animals and people inhabiting the Chernobyl region of Ukraine and Belarus.
Dr. Janette Sherman is well known for her work with epidemiologist Joseph Mangano on analyses of data after Fukushima. Their work indicates that the Japanese nuclear disaster led to a spike in US infant mortality and hypothyroidism. Dr. Sherman edited the English translation of Alexei Yablokov’s groundbreaking book, Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environment.
Dr. Alexei Yablokov was environmental advisor to Russian President Boris Yeltsin and the Gorbachev administration, as well as a co-founder of Greenpeace, Russia. His book, Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environment, compiled and translated into English more than 5,000 separate scientific reports on Chernobyl that completely contradict the World Health Organization’s report, which denied, undermined and tried to obscure the serious health risks in the wake of the accident. Dr. Yablakov died in January, 2017.
Ryuichi Hirokawa was the first non-Soviet photojournalist to document the Chernobyl disaster. The website on his humanitarian aid work with the children of Fukushima, based upon his experiences at Chernobyl, is at: kuminosato.net.
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April 11, 2019NH #407: Three Mile Island 40th ANNIVERSARY SPECIAL: Libbe HaLevy's Trip Back to TMI - Gundersen, Epstein, Folkers, Layman, More!
Three Mile Island at 40 - TMI Vigil at the gates to the reactor facility, March 28, 2019, 3:57 a.m.
Nuclear Hotseat producer/host Libbe HaLevy (right) commemorates her past.
Listen Here:

[powerpress]
A very SPECIAL Nuclear Hotseat as producer/host Libbe HaLevy returns to Three Mile Island, site of the 1979 meltdown that changed her life. An intimate portrait of the experience as she attends the 40th anniversary events, talks with other survivors, technical experts, and national activists, and provides the "You Are There" experience for those who could not attend.INTERVIEWEES INCLUDE:
Arnie Gundersen, Chief Engineer at Fairewinds Energy Education. Arnie's slides and maps will be made available shortly.
Arnie Gundersen of Fairewinds, speaking at the Three Mile Island press conference
in the rotunda of the Pennsylvania Capitol building in Harrisburg.
Eric Epstein, Chair of Three Mile Island Alert.
Eric Epstein of Three Mile Island Alert (l) and Libbe HaLevy at Penn State conference
Christine Layman, Admin of the Three Mile Island Survivors Facebook page, which now has more than 3,600 members.
Christine Laymen of Three Mile Island Survivors group on Facebook,
at the vigil recording the events. Note the line we could not cross and police presence in BG.
Cindy Folkers who specializes in radiation impact on health for Beyond Nuclear. To learn more about the need for blood tests after a nuclear accident, CLICK HERE for links to a symposium hosted by National Academy of Sciences, March 12, 2019 - March 13, 2019
Tim Judson, executive director of Nuclear Information Resource Service, or NIRS.
Participants in Heidi Hutner's upcoming film, ACCIDENTS CAN HAPPEN: The Women of Three Mile Island. LINK to the film's website and sizzle reel HERE.
Japanese Journalist Hiroko Aihara from Fukushima
The women from Japan at the TMI/40 vigil. Hiroko Aihara is on the right.
Survivors of the Three Mile Island nuclear meltdown, telling their personal stories.
...and many more

Penn State's TMI 40th anniversary events will broadcast on C-SPAN3 on April 13. If video is available after that, it will be linked to HERE.

For the full story of Libbe HaLevy's harrowing experience at Three Mile Island on March 28-30, 1979, check out her book: YES, I GLOW IN THE DARK! One Mile from Three Mile Island to Fukushima and Nuclear Hotseat. Available on Amazon - CLICK HERE or ON THE PICTURE:
Joe Rodriguez (l) of Three Mile Island Survivors on Facebook, with Libbe HaLevy and her book.
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About Nuclear Hotseat

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The weekly international news magazine on all things nuclear, hosted by Libbe HaLevy since June 14, 2011. Listened to in over 132 countries and syndicated on Pacifica Radio.