Abstract
A disturbing item came across the wires in mid-july, reporting that an unknown quantity of plutonium had been taken from a reprocessing plant in Germany. The theft was heralded as only the second time that weapon-ready plutonium—the Ecstasy of nuclear proliferation—had been found in Germany.
Newspapers fretted; this was serious stuff. Kilos of nuclear explosives might at that very moment be headed for Osama bin Laden or others of his ilk.
Although Pravda joked that the thief might “fluoresce” at night, a far more sober Sunday Times of London argued that if the anonymous “Johannes M.” (or John Doe) could successfully smuggle plutonium out of a recycling plant, it demonstrated the “lax security of German nuclear reactors and the risks of closing down atomic plants.”
But was it really time to panic? Hardly. And especially not for careful readers of the Bulletin. Lately, this magazine has kept its readers up to their eyebrows in stories about plutonium (which each and every reader has, of course, absorbed in excruciating detail). As a result, Bulletin readers could poke holes in the purloined plutonium report right from the git-go.
First, they knew from poring over the May/June issue (“Plutonium: Who Wants It?”) that there were no operational reprocessing plants in Germany. The alleged plutonium had been taken from Karlsruhe, a recycling plant that closed down more than a decade ago.
Readers would also have been correct in their surmise that no weapon plutonium had been left lying about the plant. Bulletin readers are well aware that although the sort of plutonium reprocessed from spent nuclear power fuel, which Karlsruhe once produced, might be taken in hopes of making a bomb, it's not nearly as good as the ultra-pure stuff known as “weapon-grade.”
What can be found at Karlsruhe is scattered plutonium dust in need of cleanup, along with a nasty soup of radioactive and chemically toxic gunk. This waste admittedly contains some uranium and plutonium, but it consists mainly of some 18,000 gallons of nitric acid, a lake of potential trouble aptly described by authorities as too dangerous to move.
The earliest stories said that Johannes M. had taken “liquid plutonium” home with him. Bulletin readers would instantly recognize this as some of the nitric acid mix. The amount turned out to be small—the contents of a two-inch-long cylinder.
But the hapless Herr M., who worked for the company demolishing the Karlsruhe plant, set off no alarm bells. He smuggled out his small portion of radioactive witch's brew, spilling some in the process on the rubber glove he wrapped it in to take it home, a plan that ended in contaminating him, his long-time companion, and her daughter.
Once caught, M. claimed he had taken the tube to show how lax security was at the plant, but authorities speculated he may have meant to sell it to a bigger fool. In any case, he was discovered because a routine urine test showed him to be contaminated. (In a second black mark for plant security, the test had been performed in May, but the results did not come back until mid-July.)
I'll bet you never dreamt that reading the Bulletin could lower your anxiety level.