CADU - Trains and Boats and Planes

Trains and Boats and Planes

This is an appeal for advice & info! I have noticed that timetables for trains used to say that they were carrying either ‘nuclear waste’ or ‘uranium hexafluoride’ (UF6). Now they just say ‘nuclear flasks.’ There was a French study showing that the flasks that contain UF6 could only withstand a fire for three minutes. Does anyone know if UF6 is no longer transported by rail? If you have any ideas please let me know. This maybe something that is illegal to discuss in the future if the Anti-Terrorism Bill is passed. It contains clauses about discussing the routes that nuclear waste such as UF6 Uranuim hexafluoride. This will be illegal because of fears that terrorists will bomb the trains. I don’t want to belittle the terrorist threat: it is something that anti-nuclear campaigners have been trying to point out to the nuclear industry for years. DU has been used as ballast in planes. We already know of one former aerospace worker who has tested ‘DU positive’ and has similar symptoms to Gulf War veterans. What is going to happen to other former aerospace workers who have come into contact with it? In 1999 CADU had an unconfirmed report of DU being used in ballast in big cruise ships built in Finland. If this is true then former ship builders could also be at risk. Studies have shown that DU has ended up in scrap recycling yards (You can download a copy of ‘Radioactive Scrap Metals,’ from [email protected]) Does anyone know how or where planes and ships are recycled? As DU ages it gets a higher gamma dose on the surface. What does this mean for the metals recycling industry?

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From CADU News 9 Winter 2001/2002

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Page last updated: January 28, 2003