This article informs us of a person sneaking into our nuclear power plant (which is only 20 or so miles from my house), getting up to the secured area, climbing a tower and leaving a black flag flying. I have been out by the plant on my bike and I was really surpised how insecure it was. The "gate" is a series of pylons with no one there. Its a sad commentary on how much we haven't done after 9/11. I won't completely blame the workers there as I know most of the money that was earmarked for security has been pulled into other things like the war and paying off people like Armstrong Williams but there is a good amount of blame to be placed on the guy who decided pylons would keep terrorists out.
Update: Since I don't have comments turned on, I thought I'd post an email response to this from my good friend John:
I think you need to be careful to worry about the right things here. The story suggests that the nuclear power plant maintains a "secure area" around the reactor, and the person didn't get in it. My experience with nuclear facilities here is that they guard the stuff that's important, and don't guard the stuff that isn't, which is an efficient use of limited resources. As near as I can tell from the story, that's what happened in this case.
If you don't know John he writes the science beat for the Albuquerque Journal - being that close to Los Alamos means he is the goto guy on Nukes.
You are absolutely right John, but I also agree with the idea that this is just the right prank to make sure the right questions get asked. Most of us who live within breathing space of Shearon Harris wouldn't be surprised at all to hear the guy had walked into the control room with an "Al Qaeda Rulez" flag. It may be the wrong opinion about what goes on there, but I sure would like us to be overly cautious about it.
Besides, who the hell can trust a place that misspelled "Sharon"?
Posted by dmason at November 8, 2005 10:14 AM