blog.jimbo.org.uk

« Losing the thread | Main | Olympic Fever, Baby! »

I think the difference is that one was in Japan and the other in China. China very much gives the impression of having the safety standards of Britain from around the time of the Industrial Revolution - so the coal mine thing is part of that general pattern. Japan on the other hand is a mature Westernised democracy and we tend to judge it by more modern standards of safety.

OK, how about this then: http://www.msha.gov/FATALS/FABC2004.HTM

I should point out that I'm not intending to single out coal mining here — it just seemed a convenient example of an industry where the occasional fatal accident doesn't cause headlines to the same extent it does in the nuclear industry.

I'm fairly sure I remember major headlines when a coal mine in the US or Canada collapsed leaving some people dead and some others trapped (sometime last year?)

Accidents in the nuclear industry are scary because they have the potential to cause a radiation leak etc, which accidents in most other places don't. So society rightly holds nuclear power to higher safety standards.

Would you like to explain how a leak of steam (steam is, of course, used in most useful power stations, be they coal burning, gas or oil burning, or indeed nuclear) carries an inherent risk of causing a radiation leak?

Also, there's a world of difference between being held to higher safety standards (which I suppose I agree the nuclear industry needs to be, and is — and it meets them well, at least in this country) and a significant media outcry at what in another industry would be a tragic but not that unusual occurrence.

The steam leak was caused by completely inadequate maintenance and ignoring of previous safety warnings. That's indicative of a poor attitude to safety that could very well be repeated in more critical systems.

Also, loss of coolant causing the core to overheat could easily turn into a problem there, which certainly has an inherent risk of causing a leak.

I thought there's been very little coverage of the accident in the UK, actually, and it's all felt quite low-key.

Sellafield falsifying records is a good example of the nuclear industry in this country not meeting safety standards well, btw. Ironically that lost them business from the Japanese...

http://www.hse.gov.uk/nsd/mox4.htm#Factors%20Affecting%20Fuel%20Safety%20in%20Use has a reasonable analysis of the safety impact of the falsification thing, FWIW — I think you'll find it largely says "this wasn't a safety issue really", but in a manner that employs rather more people at the HSE. Interestingly, not only was it "the Japanese", it was the same company, Kansai, that rejected the fuel. Fun!

I suppose I can't really disagree that inadequate maintenance and a culture of complacency about safety is a Really Bad Idea in the nuclear industry, and I suppose I would have hoped that Kansai would have learned from Tokaimura — but still, I don't see why this incident is worthy of the attention it's got. Which I suppose I've added to. Ho hum.