Grand jury decision on '02 nuke power plant near-rupture may come soon

http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051231/NEWS02/512310397

Ohio residents are expected to learn next month whether criminal charges will be filed against any current or former FirstEnergy Corp. employees linked to the near-rupture of Davis-Besse's old nuclear reactor head in 2002.

The reactor head became so dangerously thinned out by uncontrolled acid that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has repeatedly called it an avoidable safety lapse that posed the greatest risk to the public since the partial meltdown of the Three Mile Island Unit 2 reactor near Harrisburg, Pa., in 1979.

U.S. Attorney Greg White earlier this week told The Blade that by middle to late January he expected to make a major announcement about the findings of a grand jury in Cleveland that spent two years considering evidence compiled by the U.S. Department of Justice and the NRC's Office of Investigations.

And in a 19-page order filed on Dec. 22, the NRC's Atomic Safety and Licensing Board said it has been told by the Justice Department and NRC staffers that any indictments being handed down will come before Feb. 1. The NRC was instructed by that board to have its staff file a status report if no decisions have been announced by Jan. 23...

I mean, I hear all the time about how atoms are our friends....

Yeah, the kind of friends that burn your house down running a meth lab!

There's a nuclear reactor right where it belongs - 93 million miles away - that would provide all the energy we need, but since industry can't put a meter on it - no go....