Nuclear Hotseat

Nuclear Fox Hervé Courtois & Nuclear Hotseat's Libbe HaLevy @ the Window Rock of Window Rock AZ

• Nuclear Fox - Hervé Courtois of France, aka D'un Renard, or "The Fox" - has been a steadfast provider of reliable nuclear  news, especially from Fukushima, since the first months after the disaster began in 2011.  After many years of trying, at the International Uranium Film Festival, Libbe HaLevy succeeded in cornering him for an interview on why he became so involved with providing nuclear news, and what keeps him going.  Here are his links:
  
  • Nuclear News
  • The Rainbow Warriors on Facebook
  • Blog - Fukushima 311 Watchdogs

Nuclear disaster?  Radiation?  Contamination of Japanese food?  Fukushima sake in Manhattan?  I'll drink to that!  (... or NOT...)

• Public Comment needed on Department of Energy's proposal to abandon high-level radioactive wastes in situ -  meaning right where it is now, on site at reactors and on already contaminated lands.
  
  • Suggested wording for comments from Beyond Nuclear, CLICK HERE.
  • DOE's proposal, CLICK HERE.
• LA Times article on Marco Kaltofen: "Hidden Danger: Radioactive Dust is Found in Communities Around Nuclear Weapons"
• For the dust testing protocols after the Woolsey Fire, CLICK HERE.
  Key facts to remember:
   
  • Protect yourself from the dust and dirt with a mask and clothing that can be easily washed or even thrown away.
  • Do NOT simply send in to Fairewinds; you MUST get approval and registration with them or your sample will be disposed of without being opened.
  • The results will take at least 5 months, if not longer, to show up.  This is because of the intensity of the testing program and the number of steps that must be taken.   BE PATIENT.  When you get the data, it will be solid and scientific.

Norbert Suchanek & Marcia Olviera Gomez, Organizers
Filmmakers,  Audience Members - and one Podcaster w/a Book -
at the International Uranium Film Festival in Window Rock, Arizona.

Nuclear Hotseat went to the Capitol of the Navajo Nation in Window Rock, Arizona, to cover the International Uranium Film Festival - 22 films in three days, along with interviews with filmmakers, organizers, and attendees from France, India, Greenland, Germany, Brazil, UK, Denmark, Navajo Nation, and America.  Uranium mining contamination of water and land, nowhere to store the waste, radiation genocide of indigenous people, government cover-ups and individual activists fighting back -- the hope came from the fierce and gentle people, the beauty of the films, and the determination to keep on fighting for the one planet we all share.

The Films (CLICK on title for link, where available):

• THE WOLVERINE: THE FIGHT OF THE JAMES BAY CREE
  Canada, 2014, Documentary, Director: Ernest Webb, Original Langu age: English, 10 min.
• TALE OF A TOXIC NATION
  USA, 2018, Director Louis Berry, Documentary, English, 13 min
• DII’GO TO BAAHAANE: FOUR STORIES ABOUT WATER
  USA, 2012, 37 minutes, Produced by Deborah Begel. Co-Directed by Deborah Begel and David Lindblom, Navajo with English subtitles.
• TOO PRECIOUS TO MINE
  USA, 2017, Director Justin Clifton, Documentary, English, 10 min
• JADUGODA - THE BLACK MAGIC
  India, 2009, Director Shri Prakash, English, Documentary, 10 min
• NABIKEI (FOOTSTEP)
  India, 2017, Documentary, Director Shri Prakash, English, 66 min
• NUCLEAR CATTLE
  Japan, 2016, Director, Tamotsu Matsubara, Production Power-i Inc, Documentary, 98 min, Japanese with English subtitles.

Interview excerpt - Hervé Courtois (l) traveled to Window Rock from France.  He talks about Fukushima and his trip to Japan only two months after the nuclear triple-meltdown started.  The full interview will be featured in early 2019.

• NUCLEAR WASTE LAND?
  UK / Australia, Director Timothy Large, Production Thomson Reuters Foundation, Documentary, English,14 min
• JOURNEY TO THE SAFEST PLACE ON EARTH
  Switzerland, 2013, Director Edgar Hagen, 100 min, documentary, English
• DIGNITY AT A MONUMENTAL SCALE
  USA, 2018, Director Kelly Whalen, Producer KQED Arts, Art- documentary, English, 8 min
• YELLOW FEVER: UNCOVERING THE NAVAJO URANIUM LEGACY
  Director Sophie Rousmaniere, Co- Producer Jay Minton, USA, 2013, 56 min, documentary, English
• TO DIG OR NOT TO DIG: THE BATTLE FOR GREENLAND
  Director Espen Rasmussen, Norway, 2013, 8 min, documentary, Danish & Norwegian, English subtitles
• KUANNERSUIT / KVANEFJELD
  UK, 2017, Directors Joshua Portway and Lise Autogena, Producer Lise Autogena, Documentary, Danish and Greenlandic with English subtitles, 30 min
• THE REPOSITORY
  USA, 2017, Directors Daria Bachmann & Anna Anderson, Documentary, English, 80 min
• CRYING EARTH RISE UP
  USA,2014,Documentary.Director: Suree Towfighnia | Producer: Suree Towfighnia and Courtney Hermann. Documentary, English, 57 min
• THE RETURN OF NAVAJO BOY - UPDATE!
  USA 2000/2011, 57 min and 15 min Epilogue / Documentary, Director: Jeff Spitz, Produced by Jeff Spitz and Bennie Klain

Leona Morgan, a Diné woman involved in multiple anti-nuclear groups, left Window Rock for Poland and the COP 24 climate change meetings.  She was one of a group that disrupted a Trump administration-approved presentation on coal and fossil fuels.  Democracy Now was there and here is their video of the demonstration, which starts at about 6:30 in.  Leona speaks at around 7:55.   https://www.facebook.com/democracynow/videos/279232809403191/UzpfSTEyNjg3OTUyMTQ6MTAyMTgzMjYzMDAwMTAwNjY/

• OFF COUNTRY in-progress excerpt)
  USA, 2018, Directors Taylor Dunne and Eric Stewart, 12 min, English
• URANIUM DERBY
  US, 2017, Director Brittany Prater, documentary, English, 83 min
• ANOINTED
  Marshall Islands, 2018, Directors Dan Lin & Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner, poem video, 6 min.
• BOBBY BROWN HOMELANDS - LIVING WITH THE LEGACY OF BRITISH NUCLEAR TESTING
  Australia, 2015, Produced and Directed by Kim Mavromatis and Quenten Agius, MAV Media in Association with NITV (National Indigenous TV Australia). Documentary, 5 min
• GREETINGS FROM MURUROA - TRAILER
  France, 2016, Director Larbi Benchiha, production: Aligal production and France Télévisions, documentary, English, 52 min.

For full information on the International Uranium Film Festival, visit their website:

Norbert Suchanek (r) and Marcia  Gomes de Oliveira

Montage of protesters at the headquarters of the World Health Organization in Geneva, Switzerland,
organized by Independent WHO

• Alison Katz, the head of Independent WHO (World Health Organization), continues to expose the lies and manipulations of perception regarding radiation impacts on health at Fukushima and Chernobyl.  A special Encore presentation from Nuclear Hotseat #331, October 24, 2017.

It's an oldie but goodie - how the EPA under Scott Pruitt increased allowable exposure to radiation TEN TIMES, despite scientific evidence to the contrary - but then again, in the current EPA, who cares about science?

NOTE:  The promised episode on the International Uranium Film Festival will appear next week as Nuclear Hotseat #390. 

Santa Susana Field Lab - aerial photo of the start of the Woolsey Fire

• Santa Susana Field Lab/Woolsey Fire Analysis:  Joseph Mangano is an epidemiologist - a medical statistician - who has headed Radiation and Public Health Project since 1989.  He is author or co-author of 37 medical journal articles on radiation health, and is the author of the books Low Level Radiation and Immune System Damage: An Atomic Era Legacy (1998); Radioactive Baby Teeth: The Cancer Link (2008), and 2013’s Mad Science: The Nuclear Power Experiment.  He managed the study of Strontium-90 in baby teeth and now manages the citizen-based radiation monitoring programs near the Indian Point NY and Oyster Creek NJ nuclear plants.

Timing is everything -- and the nuclear industry seems to have none of it.  Just listen to where they give awards and make claims to nuclear projects that don't even exist any more!