Safe journey ?

[Afishionado]

Here are the results of the fishing race.........

 

Fishermen nil

 

Strontium 90

 

 

Greenpeace targets plutonium ships

 

Greenpeace campaigners hope to target two ships carrying weapons-grade plutonium as they pass through the English channel.

 

The environmental group has its own ship, MV Esperanza, stationed on the border of French and UK waters ready to intercept the vessels as they pass by.

 

Their cargo of 125 kilograms of plutonium, enough to make around 40 nuclear weapons, is heading for France from the US, where it will be converted into nuclear reactor fuel rods.

 

The plutonium carriers could pass around 16 miles off the Cornish coast and Greenpeace are waiting between Guernsey and Start Point.

 

The US government has said the plutonium was being transported by sea as a one-off exercise. The UK registered vessels Pacific Pintail and Pacific Teal were carrying the material for the US National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA).

 

The plutonium is being carried by vessels operated by the PNTL shipping company, whose main shareholder is British Nuclear Fuels ltd.

 

NNSA spokesman Bryan Wilkes said from Washington DC that the plutonium was being shipped across the Atlantic as a result of an agreement between the US and Russia to dispose of N-weapons grade plutonium.

 

It was being sent to a nuclear re-processing plant at Cadarache in southern France - a facility not yet available in the US. There the plutonium would be "spoiled" and converted into plutonium-uranium oxide fuel rods which would be returned to the US for use in a nuclear reactor.

 

If the treatment was successful, the "green light" would be given for such a facility in the US, negating the need for further plutonium to be taken overseas, said Mr Wilkes. Once converted into fuel rods, the plutonium could not be used in a nuclear weapon or for a nefarious purpose, he said.

 

A BNFL spokesman said he could not comment on security arrangements, but it has been reported that the ships have double hulls and are each guarded by 13 commandos and armed with a 30mm cannon.

 

Mad Mike