Operation Crossroads-65 years ago, another nuke event gone bad.

Baker test portion of Operation Crossroads

It seems quite timely, with all the nasty nuclear accidents/problems/screw-ups in our recent national and international history, to write about this clusterfuck of a nuclear bomb test undertaken by the military minds of the United States. From Wikipedia,a general background on what was supposed to be a series of tests conducted in the waters off Bikini Atoll 65 years ago tomorrow:

Operation Crossroads was a series of nuclear weapon tests conducted by the United States at Bikini Atoll in mid-1946. Its purpose was to investigate the effect of nuclear weapons on naval ships. The series consisted of two detonations, each with a yield of 23 kilotons: Able was detonated at an altitude of 520 feet (158 m) on July 1, 1946; Baker was detonated 90 feet (27 m) underwater on July 25, 1946. A third burst, Charlie, planned for 1947, was canceled primarily because of the Navy’s inability to decontaminate the target ships after the Baker test. Crossroads Charlie was rescheduled as Operation Wigwam, a deep water shot conducted in 1955 off the California coast.

The Crossroads tests were the fourth and fifth nuclear explosions conducted by the United States (following the Trinity test and the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki). They were the first of many nuclear tests held in the Marshall Islands and the first to be publicly announced beforehand and observed by an invited audience, including a large press corps.

The test resulted in the radioactive contamination of all the target ships by the underwater Baker shot. It was the first case of immediate, concentrated local radioactive fallout from a nuclear explosion. (The fallout from an air burst is global, held in the stratosphere for days and widely dispersed.) Chemist Glenn Seaborg, the longest-serving chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, called Baker “the world’s first nuclear disaster.”

Ah yes, the world’s first nuclear disaster. The other way to look at this disgusting, horrific fuckup is what most consider to be the first and only destruction of an entire Naval flotilla. From a book entitled The Archeology of the Atomic Bomb:

The tests involved assembling a fleet of 242 ships, 42,000 men, 156 airplanes, and tens of thousands of tons of equipment, ordnance, and material at Bikini, as well as relocating the 162 residents of the atoll–beginning an odyssey that has earned for these displaced people the sobriquet of “nuclear nomads” of the Pacific. Observers from Congress, from other nations (including the Soviet Union), and representatives of “U.S. press, radio, pictorial services, magazines, etc.” made these tests the most public and the most reported of any nuclear weapons tests.

I won’t even go into how this fuck-up literally ruined the lives of the 162 residents of Bikini Atoll. Suffice it to say,  We took them from an island that they lived quite well and happily on, and dropped them on a piece of shit island/atoll where they couldn’t even fend for themselves.

Since I don’t fancy Fox News’ approach to journalism, I will give the link to the Official Report here. It’s actually a scan of the original report, in book form, written in 1947 under the watchful eye of the Commander of Joint Task Force One…bfd, if you ask me.

Video of Operation Crossroads Bomb Blast (opens a new window)

The video above is a seven second movie. Seven seconds that changed the lives of thousands of people and cost the US Military millions o’ bucks in that they had to scuttle the entire flotilla of vessels.

One must remember that the US really didn’t know squat about the power of such a blast, being rookies in the nuclear bomb arena. We had no friggin clue as to the damage, both to humans and warships, that would be caused. The event was treated as a huge party, the military invited press from around the nation to actually watch the blast, and then file reports to their respective news agencies, from Bikini Atoll. The original Time Magazine article, written by a journalist that was at the blast, can be read here.

The following video is seven minutes long and one of the old time, movie reel-type of reports filmed before, during and after one of the Operation Crossroads blasts:



One would think..at least I do, that we would of learned a few fucking things since 1946, about the power and destruction that nuclear energy wreaks upon humans, animals and the environment.

Apparently, we haven’t learned a fucking thing..except how to lie and obfuscate when it all goes to hell in the proverbial handbasket.

Ft Calhoun Nuke Plant berm fails.

Photo courtesy of ABC News

The collapsing of the berm is a big fucking deal folks. This nuke plant was already in trouble and now this shit. From the Omaha World Herald link:

Floodwaters surrounded several buildings at the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Station early Sunday morning after a water-filled wall collapsed.

The plant, about 19 miles north of Omaha, remains safe, Omaha Public Power District officials said Sunday afternoon.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission is monitoring the Missouri River at the plant, which has been shut down since early April for refueling.

The 2,000-foot berm collapsed about 1:25 a.m. Sunday due to “onsite activities,” OPPD officials said. The Aqua Dam provided supplemental flood protection and was not required under NRC regulations.

“We put up the aqua-berm as additional protection,” said OPPD spokesman Mike Jones. “(The plant) is in the same situation it would have been in if the berm had not been added. We're still within NRC regulations.”

According to the NRC, the berm was eight-feet tall and 16-feet wide at the base. It was designed to provide protection for the plant's "powerblock" for up to six feet of water. Crews will look at whether it can be patched, OPPD officials said.

On Sunday, floodwater surrounded the nuclear plant's main electrical transformers, and power was transferred to emergency diesel generators. 

The local's are buying into the 'storyline' being fed them by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). Hey, I am just glad my happy ass doesn't reside anywhere near that nuke plant, because I would be loading up the auto with animals and belongings.

In a bit of irony, the Ft Calhoun nuke plant waged a year long battle against the NRC, to keep from adding protection measures deemed wholly necessary by the NRC to protect the plant from....wait for it... being swamped by flooding from the Missouri river. From the NYT link:

NRC inspectors concluded that at flooding levels above 1,008 feet, the plant "would experience a loss of offsite power and loss of intake structure" and water pumps providing essential cooling water to the plant. In that case, "the plant would be incapable of reaching cold shutdown" with normal operations -- a fundamental safety requirement imposed by the NRC. The commission's Region IV office in Arlington, Texas, issued a notice of violation against the plant on Oct. 6 last year, finding that the issues were of "substantial importance" to the plant's safety.

OPPD challenged the NRC's inspectors' conclusions in a series of conferences before bowing to the commission staff's demands and agreeing to install the additional defenses this year. The AquaDam water berm was installed beginning June 4. 

The berm failed because of human error: On Sunday afternoon, workers accidentally deflated an auxiliary berm at the plant, said Omaha Public Power District spokesman Jeff Hanson. Nice huh? Oh, and there is that little 'unresolved issue' too:

A still-unresolved issue in the dispute is the NRC's contention that OPPD received, but did not properly act on, a warning by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in 2003. It said high-water threats to the plant should be raised by 3 feet based on a new assessment following severe Missouri River floods in the mid-1990s. "The performance deficiency existed for many years," the NRC said in an Oct. 6, 2010, letter to the Omaha utility. 

Jaysus...the failure of the berm forced the shutdown of all electrical power to the plant..where have we heard of a nuke plant losing it's electricity recently?

I remember...Japan..Fukushima to be exact. We know how well their backup measures worked..or more precisely...failed. We can only hope the same shit doesn't happen at Ft. Calhoun. But don't panic folks..cuz they got it ALLLLLLLLL handled.

Sure they do..of course they do..and the Japanese electric company said the same damn thing in the days following the Tsunami hitting Fukushima.

They lied..oh hell yeah they lied..like a fucking rug.

So, if the locals want to believe everything is under control and just-fucking-fine...go for it people. Because electric companies never lie about conditions at nuclear plants..right?

The latest news is that the NRC head cheese will tour the plant Monday.

From Channel7KETV in Omaha, the condition of the other plant being threatened by flood waters, The Cooper Nuclear Station near Brownville, NE:

The plant, run by the Nebraska Public Power District, is protected by a series of earthen berms. A KETV NewsWatch 7 crew said the river is running about 2.5 feet below the top of the river levee. NPPD officials said the additional berms will protect the plant if the water level rises and additional six feet.

The plant buildings are about 25 yards from the river.

Plant officials said the encapsulated spent fuel rods at the plant, which continues to operate, can withstand being submerged in 50 feet of water for an extended period of time.

They also said the reactor core is protected by six inches of steel-reinforced concrete. Plant officials said the reactor is designed to keep the radiation in and the water out of the vital part of the nuclear station.

Operators at the plant said they have three different back-up plans should the plant lose power.

Jaczko talked briefly to the media and said it appears the utility is doing what it can to mitigate the flooding situation, but was non-committal as to whether the plant is in the clear yet.

Jaysus friggin Christ..a situation ripe as hell for disaster, if not one..possibly two disasters.We are talking about spent fuel rods..and all that shit.

Same crap that went down at Fukushima.