Florida Utility Accused of Nuclear Dumping (boy did they!)

[donsu]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050807/ap_on_bi_ge/nuclear_waste;_ylt=Amh_qEU35jpVMD.7fawiBZqs0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3bGI2aDNqBHNlYwM3NDk-


One of Florida's biggest electric utilities mistakenly sent a shipment of nuclear waste to a farm pasture, a spokeswoman acknowledged Sunday, but documents filed in two lawsuits appear to show it also sent the waste to sewage treatment plants and other, unknown locations.

The New York Times reported in Sunday's editions that the internal documents and government records suggest Florida Power & Light made numerous shipments from its nuclear power plant in St. Lucie County to multiple locations in the 1970s and early '80s.

The level of contamination is a point of contention between the company and the parents of two children afflicted with cancer who sued FPL.

-snip-

According to the documents cited in the lawsuits, the Times said, plant workers used a sink to wash contaminated mops, rags and other materials, believing the drain was connected to the plant's radioactive waste system. However, the drain went into a sanitary sewage system, Scott acknowledged.
-snip-
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and smirk wants to build more nuke plants

a Geiger counter would be a handy thing to have

[Shakespeare]

1. Does ANYBODY have a list of the other dumping locations?

The story doesn't mention specific locations besides St. Lucie county. There are some bizarre cancer clusters in the Florida panhandle (and home to Florida Power's big subsidiary, Gulf Power).

[madfloridian]

2. Here is a link from Australia....can't find much. Business Week.

http://www.leadingthecharge.com/stories/news-0056250.html

MIAMI - One of Florida‘s biggest electric utilities mistakenly sent a shipment of nuclear waste to a farm pasture, a spokeswoman acknowledged Sunday, but documents filed in two lawsuits appear to show it also sent the waste to sewage treatment plants and other, unknown locations. The level of contamination is a point of contention between the company and the parents of two children afflicted with cancer who sued FPL.

"It was contaminated with extremely low radiation levels," Scott said in a telephone interview. "It was comparable to a normal background radiation level. We were told by regulatory agencies that it was not an issue."

"Their attorneys are latching onto an incident that occurred 23 years ago," Scott said. "These children weren‘t born until a decade after the incident occurred.".....

And the same article from Business Week.
http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D8BR4DNO1.htm?campaign_id=apn_home_down&chan=db

[MadHound]

3. And people around here wonder why I think new nukes are a bad idea

Reason #1: Human Error. No matter what the redundancies you build in, no matter how many safeguards you put in place, shit is going to happen, sooner or later. And while mistakes are acceptable to one degree or another in other industries, you cannot have an error in the nuke industry. If you do, many many people are going to pay, possibly for generations to come.

Of course this might just explain all of the weirdness coming out of Florida.