England: at least 22 antimilitarists arrested in nonviolent action against nuclear warheads

Antimilitarist activists chained themselves in blockade of the roads leading to AWE Burghfield (nuclear weapons factory near Reading). At least 22 were arrested.

The protesters want to denounce the renewal of the British nuclear arsenal (Trident missiles, mounted on submarines), whose cost to the British taxpayer is of some 100 billion pounds. 

The protest was coordinated by Action AWE and Trident Ploughshares, with the support of the European Antimilitarist Network. This last meant that many of the arrested had passports from states such as Finland, Belgium, Spain, Japan or Argentina.

There was division of labor for the action: the main road was cut by the hardened activists of the Conscientous Objection Movement (MOC), from the Spanish State, which in the past carried on the largest ever civil disobedience campaign in Europe. At least four were arrested. 

The NW construction gate was blockaded by the Belgians, while the southern gate was blocked by the Scots.

Veteran activist of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, Pat Arrowsmith, 83, was present and sent a message for the elimination of nuclear weapons, against which she has fought all her life, since 1958. Rebecca Johnson, who helped to create the Greenhan Commons antimilitarist camp in the 1980s was also present. 

A Disarmament Camp has been held for a whole week near AWE Burghfeld. 

A photo-gallery is available here, videos here.

Sources: Action AWE (link 1, link 2), Insumissia[es], Webguerrillero[es].

Note: for those who are not familiar, the use of PVC pipes is meant to delay the dismantling of the human chain, which would otherwise be fairly easy. The activists risk their fingers or even hands by doing that.

USA: yet another alert at Hanford nuclear site: 4 workers sent to hospital

Yet another mysterious and dangerous alert was issued today at Hanford nuclear site, where hundreds of obsolete and ill-managed tanks full of nuclear material are being... done something (nobody really knows: some sort of patching and relocation).

Four workers were hospitalized with radiation damage, parts of the site got the scary order of "take cover", 1500 mSv/hr were reported... 

Source: EneNews (citing several news outlets).

USA: Hanford leaks 150 Kg (330 lbs) of uranium to the Columbia River every year

The troubled Handford facility in NW USA is leaking 330 lbs (~150 Kg) of uranium to the Columbia river per year.

The specific source is the so-called "300 Area", where uranium was milled and plutonium processed in WWII and the Cold War.

→ EneNews.

Switzerland: radioactive substance found in Lake Biel (water source)

The source is a water discharge by Muehleberg nuclear plant, which is located some 20 km upstream the Aar river, some 13 years ago.

Geologists working in a unrelated project found cesium-137 at levels claimed to be not harmful but still well above what the power plant is allowed to release, especially considering that Lake Biel water is used for human consumption. 

Greenpeace demanded that the Bern Canton prosecutor acts against the culprits. They also raised the matter on how the Federal Nuclear Safety Inspectorate missed the fault or, very possibly, decided to hide the incident.

The Muehleberg plant is located not far from the Swiss capital Bern. Switzerland has already voted to gradually close all nuclear power plants in the next two decades.

Source: Fox News (via EneNews).


Update: EXSKF has more details: the radioactive releases were not just one but three: mid-1970s, early 1980s and around the year 2000. However even more important were the the atmospheric fallout from Chernobyl (1986) and widespread nuclear testing around 1963:

The full study (open access) is available at Springer Link.

USA: Hanford nuclear leaks reaching ground

The extremely serious situation at Hanford (Washington state) is gradually being acknowledged by the media and some authorities. The obsolete containers in which a complex corrosive chemical mixture whose core are radioactive residues has broken all barriers in at least one tank. Liquid measuring not less than 800,000 cpm is out of the tanks and the managers do not even know exactly where it happened. 

The leak seems to be still contained (outside the tank) and, according to officers, it has not yet reached the nearby Columbia River, not being too much of an immediate threat to the public outside the site, but it does show how extremely precarious and rapidly degenerating is the situation at what CNN describes as "worst contaminated nuclear site" of America.

Sources: EneNews (link1, link2), CNN.

USA: leak at Hanford Nuclear Facilit only gets worse

From King5 news (via EneNews):

The new video of the waste also shows much more bright green liquid than workers had seen before. The presence of green, wet material means it is new.

This particular tank (AY-102) is not the only one leaking. On February it was reported that at least six of the Hanford tanks are leaking and that the leaks cannot be contained apparently.

The tanks were designed to last just 20 years but nuclear mismanagement has allowed the facility to continue operating for more 70 years now. This is one of the major unrecognized problems (hidden costs) of nuclear industry: that facilities that are originally designed for a few decades, get their licenses extended once and again, and that theoretically acceptable management policies fall into routine, corruption and cost-reduction vices that pose immense risks to all. In the mid or long term all nuclear operations are extremely dangerous, if not outright catastrophic, and most extant nuclear facilities on Earth have long exhausted their optimal working periods, being totally senile and therefore a major local and global danger.

Some old music: "Nuclear yes, of course!"

Before discovering Punk, I listened to almost everything that was in the radio, which in those times was quite ample, not the boring pop monotony of today. One of the bands I enjoyed the most in my pre-Punk era was Aviador Dro, a techno-industrial Castilian band of openly Anarchist ideology, who soon launched their own records company. Apparently the song that made them so popular back in 1983 was "Nuclear sí, por supuesto!" ("Nuclear yes, of course!"), which plays with nuclear apocalypse ideas so keen to the movies and other entertainment of that period to expose the madness of the nuclear ideology. Now sounds a bit silly (and also a bit sad because it evokes the terrible reality of Chernobyl, Fukushima and other places) but back in the day it was a great success, probably because the anti-nuclear struggles and the ever present threat of overnight global destruction by nuclear armaggedon of military design were in the limelight.

Lyrics (original Spanish here):

Nuclear yes, of course!
Nuclear yes, how not!

I want to swim in radium seas
with clouds of cobalt, strontium and plutonium.
I want to have lead covers
and deformed children riding their motorcycles.
Deserted ruins with beautiful swimming pools
dried up women with vampire voices
Hungry mutants searching in the streets
fresh corpses that sate their hunger

Nuclear yes, of course!
Nuclear yes, how not!

Burning hills, scorched by the sun
and forests of lights of burned skins
Monstrous snakes gulping houses
and wide deserts covered by embers 
Roaring volcanoes spitting lava
and hot zones completely razed
Hidden caves in deep beaches
and valleys covered of winged flowers

Nuclear yes, of course!
Nuclear yes, how not!

USA: fire near nuclear waste landfill threatens St Louis

So far the official figures claim no relevant radioactive danger however, chemical pollution is already official: hydrogen sulfide and benzene, very strong smell. People residing near the affected area (Bridgeton landfill, aka West Lake landfill) are being offered temporary accommodation in hotels.

Source and more details: EneNews.