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| Britain |
| Plutonium Missing From British Site |
| 2005-02-18 |
| A civilian nuclear fuels reprocessing plant in northwest England cannot account for some 30 kilograms of plutonium, enough for seven or eight nuclear bombs, a newspaper said yesterday. The annual audit of nuclear material at all of Britain's civil nuclear plants is expected to reveal that the quantity of plutonium at Sellafield was classified as "material unaccounted for" last year, The Times said. Figures published by the British Nuclear Group (BNG) each year reveal an audit of nuclear material which is admitted and processed by the various plants around Britain. A spokeswoman at Sellafield said: "This is material that is unaccounted for, and there is always a discrepancy between the physical inventory and the book inventory. There is no suggestion that any material has left the site." |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #44 Or you mean like in 'dm' (decimeter)? Probably more like 'dl' but you'd have to use multiples of 'em .... ;) |
| Posted by: AzCat 2005-02-18 9:01:30 PM |
| #43 I'd give ya three steps, maybe, putting that in yer pocket Sandy |
| Posted by: Frank G 2005-02-18 6:08:29 PM |
| #42 1/10 that is. |
| Posted by: Sobiesky 2005-02-18 5:53:23 PM |
| #41 4. ;-) Or you mean like in 'dm' (decimeter)? 10. |
| Posted by: Sobiesky 2005-02-18 5:45:02 PM |
| #40 What's D in Metric? |
| Posted by: Metric Blondie 2005-02-18 5:26:50 PM |
| #39 When does "Radioactive Blondie" showup to say "Plutonium is hard!". |
| Posted by: tu3031 2005-02-18 4:14:25 PM |
| #38 JFM, glad you clarified it. ;-) Yea, metric system is brilliant and is one and only positive thing that Frenchies can be credited for. Nothing else comes to mind. |
| Posted by: Sobiesky 2005-02-18 4:12:34 PM |
| #37 Sobiesky Fill with water a cube of, say glass, measuring 10 cm side. The difference in weight between the empty cube and the full one (ie nthe weight of the water) will be one kg. In fact all the metric system is intertwined: scientists measured the perimeter of the earth divided it 40 million and defined the meter (they were slightly off target since the earth measures around 40,100 km instead of 40,000). A liter (volume unit) is the volume of cube of 1/10th of meter side. A kilogram is the weight of the water who would fit in that cube. |
| Posted by: JFM 2005-02-18 3:57:09 PM |
| #36 Has anyone seen Sandy Berger lately? |
| Posted by: Seafarious 2005-02-18 3:11:10 PM |
| #35 JFM, That cube will weigh exactly one kg. Hate being literalist..., but if I were not, I would never get anything to work. So... That cube of water will weigh exactly one kg. |
| Posted by: Sobiesky 2005-02-18 2:56:08 PM |
| #34 NERDS! ;) |
| Posted by: Chase Unineger3873 aka Jarhead 2005-02-18 2:51:37 PM |
| #33 Metric system is very simple. You take a cube of 10 cm side (around 1/9th of a yard) and you fill it with pure water at 4 degrees Celsius (that is the temperature where water at its heaviest point). That cube will weigh exactly one kg. Plutonium has a densite of 19.8 so a cube of plutonium that size (10 cm) will weigh 19.8 kg and 30 kg of plutonium is a cube of 11.6 cm (1/8 th of a yard). It would fit into the hand of most men and a few women. |
| Posted by: JFM 2005-02-18 2:44:23 PM |
| #32 I googled for info, found this, which suggests that for best Pu-239 purity you want rods irradidated for a short time. "Very short" they quote as giving 0.9%, so my random numbers weren't that far off. A little stoichiometric error could look pretty dramatic when you try to compare the Pu-239 you actually wound up with to what you thought you'd get. Beautiful little understatement in the article: "Higher concentrations of Pu-240 can result in pre-detonation of the weapon, significantly reducing yield and reliability." |
| Posted by: James 2005-02-18 2:23:34 PM |
| #31 James: Plutonium decay series here. Plutonium is created by neutron irradiation of uranium-238. It would be found in association with uranium and uranium decay products. This plutonium began as part of nuclear fuel rods. The near aproximate amount of plutonium in each rod can be calculated, since the radiation exposure is known. As the rods are processed, the plutonium would be separated out [I believe]. The article doesn't spell out where the difference was found, but the math efforts above [much applause!] demonstrates that errors are quite possible in the calcs. |
| Posted by: Chuck Simmins 2005-02-18 1:21:17 PM |
| #30 Checked the Manhattan Project Heratige site. Fat Man had 13.6 pounds of plutonium, with a yield of 21 kilotons. 13.6/2.2 = 6.2 kilos. so about enough for 5 good sized bombs, give or take a little |
| Posted by: Weird Al 2005-02-18 12:35:21 PM |
| #29 So, Chuck, what percentage of other radioactives do you usually find the Pu mised with? I'm trying to get a feel for what kind of typos you'd need. (If you've got a ton of some alloy that's 2.3% Pu and you wrote down 3.2% . . .) |
| Posted by: James 2005-02-18 12:14:52 PM |
| #28 Bulldog, are you sure? I make it more like almost four. OTOH, I'd use it in a dirty bomb. Much more effective. Plutonium is a highly toxic heavy metal poison. |
| Posted by: Chuck Simmins 2005-02-18 12:07:38 PM |
| #27 It's enough to make about seven, IIUC... |
| Posted by: Bulldog 2005-02-18 12:00:53 PM |
| #26 I don't care how much is missing, so long as it's not enough to make a critical mass. |
| Posted by: Robert Crawford 2005-02-18 11:59:55 AM |
| #25 SPoD, only if the material is all in one place, you are allowed private access, you can get your lead-lined lunchbox into and out of the glovebox without being noticed, and then you can carry out a 30 kg (66 lbs) load plus lead lunchbox (150+ lbs total?) without being noticed by either guards or instruments. Better reinforce that lunchbox handle. Why not just go break into an underground ICBM silo -- you'd have about the same chance! |
| Posted by: Tom 2005-02-18 11:54:40 AM |
| #24 30 kg is still 66 lbs. Would take more than a few pocket loads to carry. |
| Posted by: john 2005-02-18 11:51:16 AM |
| #23 Damm it, in YOUR, lead lined... I do need to get an appointment with the eye guy.. |
| Posted by: Sock Puppet of Doom 2005-02-18 11:45:11 AM |
| #22 So you could smuggle it out in you lead lined thermos bottle or lunchbox. |
| Posted by: Sock Puppet of Doom 2005-02-18 11:30:12 AM |
| #21 Oh, I don't know about that-motive and means are both of interest. |
| Posted by: Jules 187 2005-02-18 11:28:51 AM |
| #20 Let's talk about generally accepted accounting practices as they impact the shade leaf tobacco industry. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2005-02-18 11:24:58 AM |
| #19 AzCat, misread, yea, itsa morning. Thought you refering to the size of 1kg cube (3 sq"), which would be ~ 1.732". |
| Posted by: Sobiesky 2005-02-18 11:07:12 AM |
| #18 Um. . . you said there would be no math on this quiz (whine). |
| Posted by: Doc8404 2005-02-18 11:00:01 AM |
| #17 The specific gravity of Pu is 19.84, so a cube 10 cm on a side would have a mass of 19.84 kg. A 30 kg cube would be about 11.45 cm on a side, or about 4.5 inches. AzCat is correct. |
| Posted by: Biff Wellington 2005-02-18 10:35:54 AM |
| #16 Sobiesky - It's not that early. ;) 3 sq. in. = 3" x 1" x 1" so 30 x 3 sq in ~ 4.5" x 4.5" x 4.5" Pu has a density of like 20,000 kg/m^3, unless it really is early if 30 kg were a 1.75" cube the density would be like 300,000 kg/m^3 but if 30 kg is more like a 4.5" cube it remains closer to 20,000 kg/m^3. :) But Jules is ahead of both of us: it's pretty small. |
| Posted by: AzCat 2005-02-18 10:29:33 AM |
| #15 I need some coffee and a junior high mathbook, apparently...;) I'll check back in later when fully awake. |
| Posted by: Jules 187 2005-02-18 10:17:07 AM |
| #14 So it would measure no bigger than your hand-or your pocket. Maybe it was stuffed down someone's pants or into their socks-that seems to be happening nowadays with FYEO documents... Thanks, AzCat. So, seriously, how is plutonium contained when it is handled? |
| Posted by: Jules 187 2005-02-18 10:15:48 AM |
| #13 it's that damn metric system conversion confusion... |
| Posted by: Frank G 2005-02-18 10:06:25 AM |
| #12 AzCat, that would be ~ 1.75" per side. I know... it's morning. Get some coffee brewin'. ;-) |
| Posted by: Sobiesky 2005-02-18 10:05:21 AM |
| #11 How big is 30 kgs of plutonium? 1 kg ~ 3 sq. in. so it's a cube around 4.5" per side unless I dropped a decimal somewhere in the mental arithmetic. |
| Posted by: AzCat 2005-02-18 9:46:16 AM |
| #10 That would mean SOMEONE knows where it is, in which case this is simply muzzling (arguably, rightly so) reporting. Do you think that is what has happened here? |
| Posted by: Jules 187 2005-02-18 9:37:38 AM |
| #9 It never hurts to have some extra bombs that aren't in the official count. Gives you options and plausible deniability. |
| Posted by: Tom 2005-02-18 9:33:21 AM |
| #8 How big is 30 kgs of plutonium? WHY is there always "a discrepancy between physical inventory and the book inventory"? |
| Posted by: Jules 187 2005-02-18 9:26:15 AM |
| #7 Homer Simpson took it home. And on his way home he took it out of his shirt and threw it out his car window. Don't you people pay attention? |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2005-02-18 9:20:50 AM |
| #6 The plant in South Carolina has lost hundreds of pounds. Rocky Flats in Colorado had about 350 kg MUF. In 1996, the Department of Energy reported 2.8 metric tonnes of plutonium as "inventory differences" or MUF. Remember, plutonium is dense, so 30 kilos isn't a large pile. Record keeping is the first point of failure. Math can often be the second. The plutonium is not in pure form, it's in with other radioactives. I'd carry pure plutonium in my pocket all day long. It's not that radioactive. The stuff you normally find it with, is. Stealing it would require the ability to handle deadly, highly radioactive substances. It's most likely an inventory error. The Israelis, it is generally accepted, got much of the material for their nuke program by "acquiring" it from the Savannah River plant. |
| Posted by: Chuck Simmins 2005-02-18 9:09:53 AM |
| #5 SPoD, with this being in Europe, they don't need to be Muslim. "Anti-Zionists" of any stripe will do. Israel's existence is an outrage, afterall. 30 kg... this is a big deal. Somebody can't add, or somebody's been taking home leftovers. |
| Posted by: Laurence of the Rats 2005-02-18 9:00:28 AM |
| #4 How many Muslims work at Sellafield? That might answer the question. |
| Posted by: Sock Puppet of Doom 2005-02-18 3:04:40 AM |
| #3 Much like the missing U.S. plutonium in the 70s, which was stolen by the Israelis for their own bombs. |
| Posted by: gromky 2005-02-18 1:27:11 AM |
| #2 Silkwood did it! |
| Posted by: 3dc 2005-02-18 1:07:46 AM |
| #1 and there is always a discrepancy between the physical inventory and the book inventory 30 kilos? That's a mighty discrepancy. Some may due to rounding up while measuring--that I would understand. But that should be probably within range of +/- few hundred grams. |
| Posted by: Sobiesky 2005-02-18 12:40:33 AM |