Reply #7: Perhaps you were asleep

[robdogbucky]

when the tsunami from the Japan quake hit the west coast. There were plenty of coastal communities here on the west coast that had millions of dollars in damage to marinas and harbors all up and down the coast, as far north as Vancouver and as far south as Santa Barbara.

Want me to link the many news stories about them? And that was from the quake on the other side of the Pacific.

San Onofre and Diablo Canyon are the two plants with two reactors each, that sit near known active fault lines and are "on the beach," to use an apt description. You may or may not know that an earthquake plan was ruled not applicable when the Diablo plant was built and the US Appeals Court panel that made that ruling included Antonin Scalia and Ken Starr;


At California Nuclear Plant, Earthquake Response Plan Not Required

"...But the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant, which sits less than a mile from an offshore fault line, was not required to include earthquakes in its emergency response plan as a condition of being granted its license more than a quarter of a century ago. Though experts warned from the beginning that the plant would be vulnerable to an earthquake, asserting 25 years ago that it required an emergency plan as a condition of its license, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission fought against making such a provision mandatory as it allowed the facility to be built.

The case made its way to the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., where a 5-4 majority -- including current Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia and former Clinton independent counsel Kenneth Starr -- ruled that earthquakes did not have to be included in the plant's emergency response plans.

The underlying theory was that the plant's design, which came after years of planning and geological studies, could withstand any foreseeable earthquake in the area -- the same assumption that guided thinking in Japan.

"What they're saying is that there could be an earthquake, but in no way could it ever cause a radioactive release at the same time," said Rochelle Becker, who led the San Luis Obispo, Calif., group that first sued the Nuclear Regulatory Commission over earthquake preparedness in the 1980s. "I'm pretty sure we now have evidence that it does."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/16/california-nuclear-emergency-response_n_836751.html




Is California next? Experts warn U.S. West Coast could be next victim of devastating earthquake on Pacific's 'Ring of Fire'
By Mark Duell
Last updated

The U.S. West Coast could be the next area shaken by a big earthquake, experts warned today.

The earthquakes last Friday in Japan, last month in New Zealand and last year in Chile all happened along the ‘Ring of Fire’ that encircles much of the Pacific Ocean.

Scientists believe the West Coast could be hit as part of a cluster of earthquakes, with a Pacific Northwest fault having similar characteristics to the one underneath Japan...

...‘We're worried about a large subduction zone similar to Japan,’ Mr Gaherty, of the Lamont Research Center at Columbia University, told CBS. The Ring of Fire is a chain of large faults associated with the Pacific plate’s interaction with surrounding plates, which can produce earthquakes and volcanoes...


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1366198/Japan-earthquake-tsunami-US-West-Coast-victim.html



Unfortunately, you make the same posts on every one of these threads, little content, much sound and fury about nothing. Please try to be accurate once in a while amongst your rants, although I must admit I now look forward to them, as I use them as a teaching tool.

Keep up the good work.