Nukewatch Quarterly Fall 2020

Fire broke out June 12 in France’s nuclear-powered submarine La Perle while it was in drydock in the Mediterranean port of Toulon. The submarine burned for 14 hours before firefighters extinguished the blaze, Reuters reported.

The fire was doused when foam was used to flood the sub’s rear compartments. Maritime officials said the Perle’s “reactor rooms remains untouched.” The French navy said that there were no casualties and no risk of radiation release “because the nuclear [reactor] fuel had been removed during the renovation of Perle,” the Agence France Presse (AFP) reported. “There was a fire, but no, there was not a nuclear accident,” said Defence Minister Florence Parly, according to AFP. “There was absolutely no nuclear fuel aboard and not a single weapon,” Parly said.

One of six French “attack” submarines assigned to hunt other subs and guard other nuclear-armed, long-range missile submarines, Perle did not carry nuclear weapons. Launched in 1993, Perle is already eligible for decommissioning, and the fire damage may force its retirement. —CM

—The National Interest, June 19; Defense News, June 16; Agence France Presse, and Reuters, June 13; and Forbes, June 12, 2020

Nukewatch Quarterly Fall 2020

By Bob Mayberry

The cloud of radioactive materials that floated over Europe on the 22 and 23 of June this year seems to be part of a pattern of radioactive releases from Eastern Europe that worries European scientists.

News reports followed a familiar scenario. On June 10th, a monitoring station in northern Norway detected low levels of radioactive iodine in the air. On June 23 and 24, Sweden and Finland reported “higher than usual” levels of fission products, including cesium-134, cesium-137 and ruthenium-103.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) requested more information from its member states, but the source of the radiation plume has still not been determined. The map of the plume’s movement across northern Europe led scientists to speculate that the cloud might have originated in Russia.

The Rosatom State Nuclear Energy Corporation, Russia’s agency responsible for overseeing the development of nuclear reactors, reported no excess radiation levels or incidents at any of its facilities.

This isn’t the first time Russia denied any connection to radiological releases occurring within its borders. In 2017, a radioactive plume was traced to a nuclear accident at Russia’s Mayak nuclear weapons complex for plutonium production and uranium fuel rod reprocessing.

Though Russia confirmed that a cloud of radiation had been detected over the Ural Mountains, they never acknowledged responsibility for the cloud or admitted a radiation accident had occurred. In 2019, an unexplained explosion took place on Russia’s northern coast at a Navy test range. Scientists speculated it was a reactor or nuclear weapons accident, but Russia neither confirmed nor denied this. The explosions and fire killed five high-level engineers. Some of the emergency responders that treated the injured workers were sent to Moscow to be treated for radiation sickness.

There’s a history of accidents at the Mayak facility, including the huge release of Sept. 29, 1957 known as the Kyshtym disaster.

Political analysts speculate that perhaps Russia has not acknowledged responsibility for this year’s radioactive plume because the source of the accident might be the weapons-grade plutonium facility at Mayak.

—Bob Mayberry is a retired English and Theatre Professor at Cal State University-Channel Islands.