SL-1 The Accident: Phases I and II

[atomicauto1]

...lodged in the ceiling. Also dead. WUT?!?!?

[Kohdok]

The "Sl-1 Accident, A First Responders Account" is a great follow-up to this.

[Danbo342]

This is kind of funny that the film was done in the same manner of the 1960's standard safety films. It even sounds like the same guy accompanied with the same "Leave it to Beaver" style music, haha. It just doesn't seem to do the subject justice.

[2ndAsstJizzMopper]

0:43 "Bride... of the ATOM"

[greenvanholzer]

The SL-1 itself was not built near a populated area - So that's why we built a substandard containment facility!

Reminds of a recent question about Japan. If nuclear power is so safe, why didn't they build the plant in the middle of Tokyo, so they wouldn't lost half of their electricity in the power lines, while it's being transported?

[sloth0jr]

@greenvanholzer Commercial nuclear power has a spectacular safety record - less deaths per terawatt generated even than solar power. It's safe not because it is inherently so - but rather because it isn't. It's dangerous enough when things go wrong that we overbuild commercial reactors to a huge extent. Because we can operate nuclear reactors safely does not mean that it's a given, and in any dynamic system, prudent cautions just make good sense. No worthwhile human endeavor is without risk.

[Koshy2]

@greenvanholzer Why not put a coal plant in Time Square?

[monkeyman1140]

First rule of nuclear emergencies: Cover it Up

[renascencewoman]

@monkeyman1140  :o

[happykillmore88]

12:05 : "they discovered the third man lodged in the ceiling." lol wut?

[SlightyDisturbedNBK]

@happykillmore88 Impaled by one of the control rods.

[fireman6710]

@happykillmore88 That was Richard Legg who was on top of the control rod when the reactor blew up

[squillo69]

@fireman6710 No, it was Byrnes. Read the report.

[renascencewoman]

@happykillmore88  um, impaled. dang!

[bubblybabs]

@renascencewoman Impaled - groin to shoulder... I hope he died before he hit the ceiling...

[renascencewoman]

@bubblybabs ditto

[fireman6710]

First time i saw a video on youtube that lasted longer than 10 minutes

[FreeNBK2000]

27 Roentgen. The fire capt of the first two crews that arrived at chernobyl went to check if there was anyone trapped or injured on the floor of the unit 4 reactor room (it is reckoned that there was 7 tons of graphite and 8.5 tons of fuel on the floor). He recovered a man dead, on his own, which took him 10-12 mins the radiation in the area was 35000 roentgen, Thats a dose of 5850 to 7000 rems plus the 1200 rems he'd already got. 600 rems is regarded as fatal and 18 hours later it was.

[Specterx97]

@FreeNBK2000 actually now its considered 80-100% fatal 1000 REM is considered completely fatal

[exoplanet11]

For cleaning bodies of radioactivity:

"Washing and scrubbing was used...including the use of something called *detergents*" !!

Pretty high tech.

[heatflash888]

The third man was lodged in the ceiling! how did a radiation leak do that?

[ironhorzmn]

@heatflash888 One of the rods apparently was ejected with great force and impaled him in the ceiling.

[euclon]

@heatflash888 Steam explosion as a result of reactor going prompt critical.

[Specterx97]

@euclon prompt critical is only a theory, the amount of reactivity due to the high individual rod worth and the positive thermal coefficient of reactivity of BWR's caused steam to propel the rod increasing the reactivity addition rate to sky rocket. Navy reactors now have many controls to prevent this from ever happening, and the navy has never had a reactor meltdown or a steam explosion of a Rx. No containment building or vessel is strong enough to allow the conditions for prompt criticality

[rat4spd]

@Specterx97 Spoken like a true nuke above everyones head. Prompt critical a theory? Come on.

[euclon]

@Specterx97 "The Stationary Low-Power Reactor Number One (SL-1), was a United States Army experimental nuclear power reactor. Maintenance procedures commenced, which required the main central control rod to be withdrawn a few inches; at 9:01 p.m. this rod was withdrawn almost to the top of the core, causing SL-1 to go prompt critical. In four milliseconds, the heat generated by the resulting enormous power surge caused water surrounding the core to begin to explosively vaporize." So says AEC.

[euclon]

@Specterx97 Navy? This was an Army boondoggle; a so called "portable station reactor". Your comment leads me to believe that you think prompt criticality is not possible? Seems to me an ejected very high worth rod(s) (>Beff) from an already critical Rx should do the trick. Google "SL-1 Prompt Critical"

[Kohdok]

@euclon After SL-1, the "One stuck rod" rule was put into place to make sure that prompt criticality couldn't happen the same way again.

The ML-1 was the portable reactor. It used liquid nitrogen rather than water, but suffered corrosion problems and was discontinued. This combined with SL-1 pretty much halted the Army nuclear reactor program.

Still, we paid attention to SL-1. Three Mile island proved this by not exploding or releasing severe amounts of radiation.

[euclon]

@heatflash888 Steam explosion as a result of reactor going prompt critical when the operator was manipulating the control rod.

[rwtdpontiacgto]

27 roentgen! Holy shit

[Specterx97]

@rwtdpontiacgto thats only 27 esu in dry air

[WolYou]

there was an earlier accident in 1955.

[srujan89]

thanks for posting :)

[bibbyandal]

ghost busters ambulance!!

[CrudeDude]

'58 Chevy Sedan Delivery!

[albionsseed]

Is a video of the root cause analysis posted anywhere yet?

[CrudeDude]

I would say that the root cause was the suicide of John Byrnes, who pulled the center control rod and blew the reactor because one of the other operators was "doing" his wife.

[albionsseed]

I had heard that one of them might have been doing one of the other guys on site. Really.

[CrudeDude]

Well, that figures; it was, after all , a Navy operation..

Perhaps that was the "root" cause...LOL !

[exnavyelt]

@CrudeDude It was the Army not the Navy.

[1964455]

Today you can drive right by this site and where this reactor was located and later buried is just a small bump in the ground.

[reptilespantoso]

@1964455 count your fingers.

[azntranc3951]

wow...creepy...thanks for the vid

[fourthpillar]

I love the sliderule calculations of a fried reactor :)

[misterwaugh]

amazingly creepy.

[nitrobutane]

@misterwaugh 18:23 "...Collection of scientific evidence and data went forward simultaneously with the recovery of bodies..." *Disney music in the background*