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Explosion At French Nuclear Site Kills One

Posted by samzenpus on from the someone-save-the-camembert dept.

syngularyx writes "An explosion took place in an oven Monday at the Marcoule nuclear site near the city of Nimes in the south of France. From the article: 'One person was killed and three were injured in the explosion, following a fire in a storage site for radioactive waste, Le Figaro newspaper said. It is a major site involved with the decommissioning of nuclear facilities. emergency services said.'" Update: 09/12 16:20 GMT by S : Changed headline and summary to reflect that there seems to be no risk of a leak.

11 of 262 comments (clear)

  1. Cue more irrational nuclear panic in 3...2... by elrous0 · · Score: 5, Informative

    In other news, 30 coal miners die each year in the U.S. alone and no one gives a rats ass.

    Deaths per terawatt hour (from nextbigfuture.com):

    Coal – world average: 161
    Coal – China: 278
    Coal – USA: 15
    Oil: 36
    Natural Gas: 4
    Biofuel/Biomass: 12
    Peat: 12
    Solar: 0.44
    Wind: 0.15
    Hydro: 0.10
    Nuclear: 0.04

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
    1. Re:Cue more irrational nuclear panic in 3...2... by kent_eh · · Score: 5, Informative

      In other news:
      a petroleum pipeline explosion has killed at least 100 so far today in Kenya.
      From linked article:

      "The scene is horrific, with charred bodies all around. I cannot differentiate between men and women or boys and girls. All that is left are bones, and the only way to identify the children is from their smaller skeletons."

      --

      ---
      "I can't complain, but sometimes still do..." Joe Walsh
    2. Re:Cue more irrational nuclear panic in 3...2... by djmurdoch · · Score: 3, Informative

      The linked source claims there are 30000 deaths per year from coal, and 2000 Twh. Those are roughly consistent with your numbers.

      They aren't all coal miners, so it's also consistent with the OP.

    3. Re:Cue more irrational nuclear panic in 3...2... by CrimsonAvenger · · Score: 3, Informative

      Yeah, because Uran-miners often don't die in mining accidents. They cannot continue to work due to cancer, whose causation cannot be proven to be from the working environment.

      No, the difference is that we mine far less uranium than we do coal.

      Note that it requires about 10,000 times as much coal as natural uranium (the kind you get out of the ground and then enrich to make nuclear fuel) to produce a given amount of energy.

      If we were to replace all electricity production in the USA with nuclear plants, we'd need to mine less than one tenth the uranium to run them all than the coal required for ONE big coal-fired plant.

      --

      "I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
  2. RTFA! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    The article states that there is NO risk of a radioactive leak. Geeezuz H Me, couldn't someone vet this stuff before it gets posted?

    1. Re:RTFA! by alci63 · · Score: 4, Informative

      Well... the article says the Nuclear Safety Authority _says_ there is no risk of radioactive leak. They also said the radioactive cloud from Tchernobyl stopped at the country borders :-)

  3. Slashdot the new Midnight Sun!!! by LWATCDR · · Score: 3, Informative

    Freak, an oven exploded killing a working in the plant. There IS NO LEAK. THEY EXPECT NO LEAK. THEY DO NOT EXPECT A LEAK!
    FREAKING HECK PEOPLE!!!!!
    If this was a Lego factory no one would care.
    We had two workers die at my local power plant. They where putting giant snow flakes on the smoke stacks for Christmas! Really this is just to the point of being shameful.
    HOW BAD IS THIS TITLE!
    From the link in the story!!!!!!!!!!
    "There was no risk of a radioactive leak after the blast, caused by a fire near a furnace in the Centraco radioactive waste storage site, said officials."
    REALLY JUST SHUT DOWN SLASHDOT your are killing it with your abuse!

    --
    See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    1. Re:Slashdot the new Midnight Sun!!! by cultiv8 · · Score: 4, Informative
      My favorite line FTA:

      There are no nuclear reactors at the southern French site

      --
      sysadmins and parents of newborns get the same amount of sleep.
    2. Re:Slashdot the new Midnight Sun!!! by Oxygen99 · · Score: 3, Informative

      Heh, I know it's bad form to reply to your own post, but a quote from the Guardian story on this made me laugh.

      The papers said the body of one male worker at the plant had been "found carbonised", but it added that there was no evidence that the explosion had "caused any radioactive leak".

      A spokesman for the French atomic energy authority told journalists: "For the moment, there is nothing coming out."

      Emphasis, mine, obviously.

      --
      I had a dream, bright and carefree, but now there's doubt and gravity
  4. Re:From Here : by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Informative

    Lies. France is particularly transparent regarding nuclear incidents. They even invented a level 0 incident. And absolutely everything is published on the website of the ASN http://www.asn.fr/ . Now if other industries could be even half as transparent

  5. First Sentence of TFA by asylumx · · Score: 4, Informative

    There was no risk of a radioactive leak after the blast

    Slashdot, please fix the damned headline.