Explosion at French nuclear site of Marcoule

[UtwigMU]

Here we go again: Again MOX is involved there is fire and radioactive leak possible. I have relatives in the area.

One person has been killed and four injured, one seriously, by an explosion at the southern French nuclear site of Marcoule.


There were no radioactive leaks after the blast, caused by a fire near a furnace in the Centraco radioactive waste storage site, officials said.

It produces MOX fuel, which recycles plutonium from nuclear weapons, but does not include reactors.

It is a major site involved with the decommissioning of nuclear facilities.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-14883521

No leaks but then Fukushima was looking fine for first day even though reactors melted soon and were shattered by earthquake and severity of Chernobil was also not reported during first weeks.

EDIT: also no reactors, they only reprocess spent fuel there.

[Brian Ellis]

As you say, here we go again! Explosions from scrap metal fusion are an almost daily occurrence and resultant fatalities throughout the world probably occur every week. However, this is coupled with the buzzword nuclear, so it hits the media, even though it is non-nuclear.

The company concerned, Centraco, is on the Marcoule site but has nothing to do, at least directly, with nuclear reprocessing and does not handle radionuclides. It incinerates combustible wastes in a very sophisticated furnace and casts ingots from scrap metal. The explosion happened in an induction furnace for the fusion of metals. (info gathered from the Centraco website, in French)

2 or 3 years ago, a steam pipe fractured in the turbine hall of a Japanese nuclear power station, killing 2 workers with live steam. The international media went to town because it was a nuclear facility, even though it was in a separate building to the reactors. Similar accidents happen frequently in fossil fuel facilities, because steam at 300°C and at high pressure is devilishly difficult to contain reliably over long periods because of thermally-induced phase changes in the metallurgical structure of steel pipes. But such accidents are never reported beyond a short paragraph in the local township paper, even though there may be 3 or 4 deaths, because no one can attach the word 'nuclear' to it.

Why are journalists allergic to the word 'nuclear' and thereby cause misinformation?

[Evildead666]

According to the news outlets here, its all over, there's nothing to see/be worried about.
One guy says its fine, and the reason there is no leak is that no security perimeter was set up.

Explosion happened around 11-ish CET, and fire was controlled by 13h CET.

I suppose Nuclear has become a bad tasting buzzword, and it gets hits

[Dr Mordrid]

Like Brian said - a non-news event save for the single fatality. The facilities like this that do process radionuclides only do lower level nuclear waste like that from hospitals and some industrial uses, not reactor cores or anything like that.