IP: U.K. gvt warns of Y2K nuke power outage, radiation leak

[Dave Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>]

Date: Fri, 24 Jul 1998 07:36:04 -0700 (PDT)
From: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>


From: byrlip () enterprise net (Adam)
Subject: Chernobyl - coming soon to a town near you!
Date: Fri Jul 24 04:41:23 PDT 1998


New Scientist magazine article 25th July 1998


Nuclear Hangover
by Rob Edwards
Millennium revellers may wake to news of a radiation leak
(photo caption) In control: but what will happen on 1 January 2000?


A serious accident could occur at a nuclear plant as computers fail to
recognise the year 2000. The millennium bug could disrupt power
supplies, disable safety systems or even cause a radiation leak, warn
British Safety regulators.


The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) says the bug has been found in
four alarm and monitoring systems at British nuclear plants. The HSE's
concerns are revealed in a paper given to a private-meeting of
European nuclear regulators at Ljubljana in Slovina last month. The
paper, by David Hunns, head of systems assessment at the HSE's Nuclear
Safety Directorate, warns: "The nuclear industry should not leave
acting until the last minute, hoping to muddle through."


The millennium bug could cause simultaneous failures in nine different
types of safety systems, including atmospheric monitoring, fire alarms
and security systems. While this would be unlikely to prevent plants
from automatically shutting down, it might cause cooling and
lubrication to fail, warns the paper. "This would, of course, place in
jeopardy the maintenance of safe shutdown. Erroneous information may
be generated which, if not checked, may result is unsafe actions."


[...snip...]






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