Why Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant in New York Should be Closed

Browsing the Internet tonight looking for information on the aging and decrepit Indian Point Nuclear Plant in Buchannan, New York, I stumbled upon Microsoft's new Beta program called Bird's Eye View. There are a myriad number of issues with Indian Point, any one of which should be more than enough to shut down and decommission said facility. A flawed and non workable Emergency Evacuation Plan is one, another is the deterioration of the reactors as a result of their age, leaking high level radioactive fuel rod storage facilities that I believe are leaking from the inside out another. However, the biggest reason to shut this site down and begin immediate decommissioning is its vulnerability and susceptibility to a terrorist attack. This vulnerability to attack becomes crystal clear when one views the quality of photographs available online via Bird's Eye View to any terrorist organization with access to the Internet.

The picture above is one of six available from Bird's Eye View, and viewed with the program are large enough to get a very accurate 3-D quality understanding of the site, its layout, design and weaknesses. With little trouble at all, even a boy scout could create a fairly accurate map of the facility. In Peekskill, down at the end of Hudson Street is a public access point from which small watercraft could be launched into the Hudson River. If one were looking for a more private and secluded place from which to launch an amphibious attack on the Nuclear Facility, one would not have to look far as there are several secluded spots within easy walking distance of said public launching area.

I'm not a security expert, but have done quite a bit of hunting back in the days when Southern Ohio was called home. Looking at the above picture, there seem to be numerous weak spots where Indian Point could be vulnerable to attack....one such point I would think, would be to land an amphibious assault under cover of darkness using the cover of the trees in the pictures left upper foreground.

For the sake of modeling purposes, lets assume eight two man kayak's, each with a two man crew, or an assault force of sixteen men...each of these men for the sake of modeling has training equivalent to say our own United States Navy Seals, four of them experts in explosives. If the kayaks were dark in color, and the men dressed in black, it would be all but impossible to get a visual on them, and their paddling would be almost deadly silent in nature. The river for the most part is not abundant in security lighting, and hugging the shoreline, it would be a fairly quick trip up river.

One Advertisement online for the Pungo 120:

Leave the motor boat at the dock and explore new waters and new adventures aboard one of our sporting kayaks. Quiet, zero-polluting and stealthy, our recreational and S-O-T kayaks are rigged and ready to pursue the quarry of your choice.

A rather ominous advertisement as I paint a scenario for launching and amphibious attack on Indian Point, and one I find bothersome as a citizen living within the ten mile circle of death around the facility. With eight of these boats, and sixteen trained and determined men, how much gear could be silently whisked up river the few miles to the landing zone? How much would actually be necessary for such a trained and deadly attack force? Assuming this attack force has the element of surprise, and looking at the photograph found on Microsoft's Bird's Eye View, it appears a small distance from the landing site to one of the reactors.

Assuming said attack force has the element of surprise, it seems a logical assumption that two men could be sent off to another section of the compound to create a destructive diversionary attack to pull security forces away from the primary target. Under the stealth and darkness of a starless night, the four explosives experts would make their way to the reactor...not being an explosives expert here, I don't know how long it would take to begin placing strategic timed explosives in various locations, perhaps on the reactor itself, and if time allowed, perhaps even some of the adjoining strategic support buildings, or one of the spent fuel storage facilities.

With our role playing team of sixteen, you would still have a team of six members providing cover for the explosives experts, and if not immediately discovered, perhaps wreaking their own fair amount of damage on the facility with shoulder mounted rocket launchers.

Perhaps some will feel this scenario is overly imaginative, far fetched, and very unlikely to occur...but then, 9/11 was not something any of us could have imagined, and that sad day in our American History used 19 determined terrorists, three more than this scenario would employ. 9/11 required 19 terrorists hijacking four commercial jets, flying two into New York's twin towers, and one into the Pentagon. The scenario I have painted requires eight kayaks, a rudimentary knowledge of timers and plastic explosives, and a small handful of men with military style training, with the ability to do basic Internet searches. With eight kayaks, it is assumed quite an arsenal could be easy put in place at the chosen landing sight provided by the trees in said picture above.

Based on the scenario I have just created, I would ask the NRC (Nuclear Regulatory Commission) and Entergy to tell us the general public living within ten miles of Indian Point that their security forces alone, with no back up, have the ability to repel such an attack...if they cannot provide such assurances, then the sight is not safe, is subject to a likely terrorist attack in one of the most populated areas of the United States.

 

Click on picture for larger three dimensional view.