Monday, August 13, 2012

Nuclear fears over French Polynesia atoll collapse

A mushroom cloud rises above Mururoa AtollPHOTO: A mushroom cloud rises above Mururoa Atoll, French Polynesia, after a French nuclear test there in 1970. (file photo: AFP)

The Nuclear Association in French Polynesia has raised concerns that Murorua Atoll, the site of French nuclear testing in the Pacific, is in danger of collapsing. Murorua e Tatou says the issue was detailed in a leaked report from the Ministry of Defence to the French government dated March 2010. The Nuclear Association's president, Roland Oldham, told Radio Australia's Pacific Beat program that radioactive material could be released into the Pacific Ocean if the atoll were to collapse. "Just in that little area there is over maybe twelve underground tests in that area and we have to remember that France have done altogether 193 nuclear test explosions in Murorua," he said. "In the soil of Muroroa, if something happens there is about 150 holes containing very dangerous radioactivity." The association says if the atoll were to collapse it could also trigger a 15 metre tsunami...

more: Nuclear fears over French Polynesia atoll collapse - World - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

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