A Blog By James Curran: Who's Covering Up Chalk River Leak?

Sunday, February 8, 2009

Who's Covering Up Chalk River Leak?

Is it the nuclear watchdog? Why isn't this a priority for Lisa Raitt and Stephen Harper? Why is Greg Weston seemingly the only person in the MSM that gives a damn about 7000 litres of radioactive spill per day?

7 comments:

Jennifer Smith said...: To be accurate, the 7,000 litres a day pouring out of the reflector tank isn't radioactive. It's just the 47 kilos of tritiated water that spilled out onto the reactor room floor that was radioactive. They still have no idea where that stuff came from.; Feb 8, 2009, 1:03:00 PM
James Curran said...: You mean 7000 litres of "safe radiation" levels?; Feb 8, 2009, 1:07:00 PM
RuralSandi said...: "they have no idea where the stuff came from" - isn't that enough to scare the sh**t out of you.

Weston was horribly hard of Dion and kept writing about him....but now he's at least dealing with some real issues.

Hello media, where are you?; Feb 8, 2009, 1:25:00 PM
Jennifer Smith said...: James -

No, really - the water from the reflector tank is not radioactive at all. My husband used to work at an accelerator lab and is very familiar with reactors and nuclear safety, so I've been running all this past him and that's what he's told me.

The tritated water, on the other hand, is from a different part of the reactor and is very dangerous. He says a spill like that would have contaminated the floor to the point where they would have to rip out the floor.; Feb 8, 2009, 4:19:00 PM
Mala Fides said...: Okay Jennifer,

If this is only minor stuff:

1) Why are we not getting the whole story? And why didn't we get the whole story from day one?

2)Where is the official report (it will only take an freedom of information search to get to some version of the truth)?

3) Why did it take almost two (2) months for the government to release the information?

4) When did Harper or his Minister first hear of the problems?

5) What about the tritium released into the atmosphere in the form of steam?

6) Why is the Mayor of Pembroke so pissed off (maybe because he lives downstream from Chalk River)? Is he worse off than Ottawa? http://www.cbc.ca/canada/ottawa/story/2009/02/03/ot-090203-radiationwater.html

7) WHy doesn't CBC News have the story that was on TV last night up on their website?

AND

8) Why did Harper fire Linda Keen and then promise Canadians that there would be NO NUCLEAR ACCIDENT AT CHALK RIVER???????!!!!!!!

WHERE IS THE INQUIRY???; Feb 8, 2009, 5:48:00 PM
Jennifer Smith said...: Whoa whoa whoa! I most certainly did NOT say that this is "only minor stuff". I said that specifically, the water that is pouring out of the reflector tank at the rate of 7,000 litres per day is not radioactive. As opposed to the tritiated water that leaked from a still unknown source that IS radioactive.

I have been following this story in detail since last year. Hell, I live in Lisa Raitt's riding. Trust me - I have a pretty good idea exactly what the problems are with Chalk River. You've hit on a lot of them.

I just think we need to be careful not to make careless errors of fact and not to exaggerate the risks. The truth is scary enough.

(and two of the 'official reports' are here and here.); Feb 8, 2009, 6:46:00 PM
Mala Fides said...: Sorry Jennifer, I completely jumped the gun on you.

I took a trip over to your blog and you have done a great job!

The way the Government and the media have handled this situation falls far below any acceptable standards.; Feb 9, 2009, 7:18:00 AM