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Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

reuters.com

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Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#81

Post by ffhhj »

estro0182 wrote: post #9

I would argue that this is a near equivalence of nuclear war with Ukraine. A well-/mis-placed Russian artillery shell could cause a loss of reactor integrity and meltdown, no? EDIT: according to child comments, a meltdown is unlikely/impossible, but spread of radioactive particles due to a direct strike is possible.

> near equivalence of nuclear war

If radiation escapes it would be a "dirty bomb" equivalent event, it will speed up sanctions and nations will urge Russia to allow experts to inspect the damage.

A meltdown/explosion is possible if they damage safety systems/shielding. Still won't be seen serious as a "nuke detonation" event, but countries that receive fallout will be pissed off.

If Russia continues causing more nuclear pollution that affects it neighbors, yes, it could mean war scalation.

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#82

Post by megous »

megous wrote: post #33
doener wrote: post #15

"BREAKING: Ukraine's energy ministry claims firefighters have been fired at while trying to put out fire at Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant" https://twitter.com/spectatorindex/status/149954992461016678...

Well, I've been watching the video for a while before the fire started, and there was shooting going on towards the building that's on fire from the units stationed between the parking lots. Then there was/is fire. Then presumably firefighters arrived, were not let through and departed away.

Hmm, and the live stream got truncated, now it doesn't have the whole 3h history, but just 1 minute. Damn.

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#84

Post by jessriedel »

estro0182 wrote: post #60
jessriedel wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. It is many orders of magnitude less dangerous. It would potentially cause thousands of deaths, not hundreds of millions . This is true even if a melt down was caused, like Chernobyl, which others have already explained is quite improbable. Chernobyl caused between ~100 and ~16,000 deaths, depending sensitively on how one models the effects of small (sub-natural-background) radiation increases over a large populat…

I am using nuclear war in a literal sense, but I do see how my wording seems sensationalist given historical context.

It's not equivalent to nuclear war with Ukraine in either the sense of relative risk (for the reasons I gave) nor in the sense in which the term "nuclear weapons" is actually used. Russia intelligence agents poisoned Alexander Litvinenko with radioactive polonium, but this was not called a nuclear attack because that's not what the term means.

One could argue, at most, that this would be equivalent to a radiological weapon ("dirty bomb"). But even then it wouldn't be correct because of the important difference between purposeful radiological dispersal and radiological dispersal as a side-effect of a legitimate military action.

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#85

Post by Gare »

lupire wrote: post #62
throwanem wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Potentially. I'd worry more about coolant and power (to run the coolant pumps if the plant has to shut down) than about direct hits on a containment structure, but it's not like that won't eventually also cause problems if they keep doing it. This is, so far as I know, the first time anyone has carried out a military attack on an operating nuclear plant. Nobody knows yet how that really plays out. But it looks like w…

We know what happened in Japan when an earthquake attacked a nuclear plant.

Technically, it was tsunami that caused trouble.

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#86

Post by photochemsyn »

estro0182 wrote: post #9

I would argue that this is a near equivalence of nuclear war with Ukraine. A well-/mis-placed Russian artillery shell could cause a loss of reactor integrity and meltdown, no? EDIT: according to child comments, a meltdown is unlikely/impossible, but spread of radioactive particles due to a direct strike is possible.

Well, recall that the Fukushima meltdowns were due to loss of emergency power, resulting in the inability to circulate coolant through the reactor core. Any kind of damage to the power plant that results in such power loss or damage to the coolant system could plausibly result in a meltdown / hydrogen explosion in the reactor core.

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#87

Post by ch4s3 »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #29

If Russia explodes a dirty bomb that plumes into nato countries, what happens?

Fortunately that kind of not a thing. Pulling fuel out of a reactor without special tools and training would 100% kill you, and trying to build a bomb with a fuel rod assuming you got it out would also kill you. Transporting that bomb without thick concrete or lead shielding would also kill you. Blowing it up would put a bunch of heavy dust in the air that would fall out quickly and could easily be washed off of anyone it got on without significantly endangering them as long as they don't consume it. And after all of that, NATO might get involved.

TL;DR it would take a concerted effort to build such a bomb without killing yourself only to build a worse bomb that would draw in NATO.

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#89

Post by jessriedel »

andbberger wrote: post #68
jessriedel wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. It is many orders of magnitude less dangerous. It would potentially cause thousands of deaths, not hundreds of millions . This is true even if a melt down was caused, like Chernobyl, which others have already explained is quite improbable. Chernobyl caused between ~100 and ~16,000 deaths, depending sensitively on how one models the effects of small (sub-natural-background) radiation increases over a large populat…

A single nuke would be more like 100k deaths, still several orders of magnitude safer. But yes, the actual danger posed by radiation is far less than what it is imagined to be

Sure, but this is neither a nuclear weapon (it would be, at most, a radiological weapon) nor risk-similar to one.

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#90

Post by trhway »

ceejayoz wrote: post #17
ttybird2 wrote: post #10

I do not understand, why are they fighting near the reactor? It only makes sense to keep troops of both sides away from something as dangerous.

One side goes “hey they won’t shoot us if we’re near the plant”. The other side goes “hey no fair”. Things escalate. It’s war, and it sucks.

One side was unarmed civilians blocking the road to the plant for couple days until Russians started to shoot and wounded several civilians.
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