9 Comments

  1. Rod

    You got the zeros correct in your conversion but you left the original decimal point between the 5 and the 2.

  2. You wanted proofreading – well, as a start, usually there aren’t two decimal points in a number?

  3. Yup, when I saw limited news coverage of this the other day, I thought to myself, where’s the 24-hour red-banner ALERT coverage from CNN that carcinogens are being spewed into the environment? Where’s Helen Caldicott explaining alarmingly that carcinogens are being spewed into the environment for hundreds of miles, and pleading for someone to “Please think of the children”? where is the “Plume Watch” coverage, showing the plume of pollution spreading across the country long after it’s so dilute it’s invisible, can’t be smelled, or detected without sophisticated scientific equipment?

  4. Rod, as you might expect, local coverage actually interrupted regular TV coverage throughout the night…the starting toward the end of the evening rush hour. It was non-stop at least through 11pm. NBC’s local affiliated even interrupted the Olympics with bulletins.

    There has been decades long opposition to this refinery and there are even groups supporting its closure (which would be a disaster on several levels if this were to occur). But I think the juxtaposition what it is they report and the general reaction by the public shows the nasty propaganda of anti-nuclear activists to be totally missing here even as hundreds were sent to the hospital. The point about the liar Caldicott was well taken.

    Residing exactly 1.2 miles from the San Bruno fire site,
    David Walters

  5. I’m too small fry for the media to respond to, but I’d like to implore nuclear heavyweights like ANS and NEI to just send the media an email regarding the disproportional coverage of this oil accident — which is actually making people sick — as opposed alarmist coverage of SONGS where nothing has happened, and just publicly post the media’s answer. A cherry on top is for ANS/NEI+ to offer the media to consultant them on nuclear issues and features rather than freelance hatchet men (like Arnie and Helen). Just send them that email and post their reply to you, guys. That’s all I ask. The replies would be telling.

    James Greenidge
    Queens NY

  6. The company that operates San Onofre is just SCE (Southern California Edison), not SCEG.

  7. Re” “There are many people who will dismiss the difference in coverage that will inevitably occur between a very consequential refinery conflagration and a nuclear power plant tube leak as being caused because the media is biased against nuclear or because the media’s audience has such a deep fear of nuclear that it will keep tuning in or reading stories that stoke that fear.”

    Yes, you hit it dead on. I dearly hope there’ll be a Atomic Show roundtable on this issue one day with top pro nuke bloggers (and wishfully reps of ANS/NEI etc) about the effects of and how such biased reporting can be countered on local and national levels. It’s a shame that all these nuclear conferences going on only seem to mention the issue in the rest rooms.

    James Greenidge
    Queens NY

  8. The environmental justice community has covered the Richmond fire via social media but these outlets reach far fewer people and are much less influential. I think you’re right that the disparity in news coverage is based primarily on nuclear phobia but I don’t think you can discount the influence of wealth and ethnicity (which translate into power) either.

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