Nuclear Hotseat

Featured image:  Prof. Chris Busby (r) with the late Alexey Yablakov,
editor of Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environment

• Prof. Chris Busby is a British scientist and activist known for his work on the health effects of ionizing radiation.  He often appears in UK court as an expert witness in radiation-related cases. His website is: GreenAudit.org.

San Francisco may have plans and given permission to develop Treasure Island into a mega-development of homes, shops, hotel rooms, parks and office space... but ya think that maybe, just maybe, they should take a look at the radioactively contaminated soil and groundwater they're planning to build it on?  Have they learned nothing from the problems in North St. Louis?

Focus this week is on "Atomic Homefront," a documentary about the families in North St. Louis fighting against radioactive contamination of their homes from the illegally buried WWII nuclear weapons waste in  Westlake Landfill -- and the underground fire at the adjacent Bridgeton Landfill that can't be put out and is advancing on the radioactive waste.

Interviews include:

• Rebecca Cammisa, director of "Atomic Homefront"
• Dawn Chapman, co-founder of Just Moms, StL  She is one of the residents living near the landfill whose activist response is featured in the film.
• Robbin Ellison Dailey, who lives adjacent to the Westlake Landfill and has discovered radioactive waste inside her home.  An Encore presentation from Nuclear Hotseat #283 from November 22, 2016.

Black is white, bad is good, up is down, and Vice President Mike Pence says that nuclear bombs are good for peace!  George Orwell must be turning over in his grave!  

• Steven Starr is a senior scientist with Physicians for Social Responsibility and an Associate of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. www.NuclearDarkness.org
  Make sure you check out the Firestorm Simulator.
• NukeMap - Find out what a nuclear bomb of any size would do to your, yes YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD!

The Los Angeles-area Joint Regional Intelligence (put that word in quotes!) Center is so freaked out by North Korea having along range missile theoretically capable of reaching the US West Coast that they've sent out a 16-page "Nuclear Attack Response Considerations" that:

• give "radiation protection basics" almost identical to 1950's "Duck and Cover" exercises;
• warn that during evacuation (on the 405 Freeway/Parking lot?) the public may be experiencing "high anxiety" (ya think?);
• instructs government entities to "remain operational... (and) maintain order;
• and says not one word about the spent fuel pools at San Onofre.

If activists can get to the spent fuel pool with fireworks, what could someone with malicious intent do with real explosives?  THAT'S THE POINT!

This handout photograph taken and released by Greenpeace early October 12, 2017, shows a firework exploding at the Cattenom Nuclear Power Plant, some 50kms north of Metz.
Greenpeace environmental activists were arrested after briefly entering the Cattenom nuclear power plant in Lorraine (eastern France) to alert the vulnerability of these sites to a possible attack. "Greenpeace activists on site, stopped by the gendarmes, no access to the nuclear zone, no impact on the safety of the installations", according to the twitter account of the power station, located a few kilometers from the border of Luxembourg. / AFP PHOTO / Greenpeace / HO / IMAGE AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD BY EXTERNAL MEDIA FOR 10 DAYS AFTER RELEASE -- RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE - MANDATORY CREDIT "AFP PHOTO / GREENPEACE " - NO MARKETING NO ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS - DISTRIBUTED AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS -- NO ARCHIVE --