Feds sound alarm on nuclear evacuations

[bananas]

Source: Associated Press

Regulators and congressional investigators clashed today over a new report warning that in the event of an accident at a nuclear plant, panicking residents from outside the official evacuation zone might jam the roads and prevent others from escaping.

The report by the Government Accountability Office, which acts as the investigative arm of Congress, challenges a three-decade-old fundamental of emergency planning around American nuclear power plants: that preparations for evacuation should focus on people who live within 10 miles of the site.

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The investigation was requested by four U.S. senators: Democrats Barbara Boxer of California, Robert P. Casey Jr. of Pennsylvania and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, and independent Bernard Sanders of Vermont. They asked for the report in 2011 in response to an Associated Press investigative series reporting weaknesses in community planning for nuclear accidents, including the likelihood of surprisingly large shadow evacuations.

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The series further documented how federal regulators have relaxed safety standards inside aging plants to keep them within the rules and avoid the need for shutdowns.

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Read more: http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2013/04/feds_sound_alarm_on_nuclear_ev.html

[Downwinder]

1. Does anybody know where their local shelter is located?

[Lochloosa]

2. If you don't go to two places. The closest hospital or a federal or state courthouse

The hospital are built with radiation exposure in mind..(i worked in one for 13 years) and courthouses are (or were) always built as nuclear shelters.