Nuclear Truckers: The Axles of Evil?

[jettakd]

Big rigs with bombs are secretly cruising the interstate near you. But how safe are they from terrorists or accidents?

-By Adam Weinstein | Wed Feb. 15, 2012

Comments

[13chapters]

In 2010, DOE inspectors were tipped off to alcohol abuse among the truckers. They identified 16 alcohol-related incidents between 2007 and 2009, including one in which agents were detained by local police at a bar after they'd stopped for the night with their atomic payload. After several agents and contractors were caught bringing unauthorized guns on training missions in Nevada between 2001 and 2004, DOE inspectors determined that "firearms policies and procedures were systematically violated." One OST agent in Texas pled guilty in 2006 to trying to sell body armor, rifle scopes, machine gun components, and other assault gear he'd pilfered on the job.

HOLY SHIT.

I actually had a conversation about nuclear materials transportation with a coworker recently. She claimed that cities that declare themselves to be "nuclear free" aren't making some kind of absurd political statement, which had always been my assumption, but are instead keeping these trucks outside of their city limits. In context, I think her claim is bunk, because she said that this was why Santa Cruz, CA is a "nuclear free zone" and that before they did that, trucks from Livermore Labs carrying nuclear materials in Berkeley were passing through Santa Cruz. This doesn't make sense to me because it would be totally out of the way and not at all a convenient route.

HOWEVER, it makes sense in theory. Does anyone know if declaring one's town to be "nuclear free" can make the trucks reroute around the town? It doesn't seem like something that would hold up very well.

[squeeful]

Highly unlikely. The routes in the map above are part of the Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways. They're federal, not local or state roads.

Santa Cruz is bypassed because of its geography, not because they declared themselves "nuclear free". Highways 17 and 101 going through the Santa Cruz area are narrow, windy, with sharp turns, steep inclines and banks, and unlike 5 are not designed to maximize traffic flow. Nuclear trucks (and a lot of trucks in general) don't go through there because it's too hazardous, not because it's what the inhabitants want.

[13chapters]

THAT'S WHAT I SAID TO MY COWORKER.

Sorry for the caps, it was a very annoying conversation. (My coworker is a very annoying person, tbh. She insisted she knew better because I wasn't even born yet when Santa Cruz declared itself nuclear free and she was. I went to UC Santa Cruz and know the geography pretty damned well, her whole story made no freaking sense to me.)

[squeeful]

Lol, it's okay!

She can take her self-centeredness and stick it where the sun doesn't shine and the granola won't go.

[eyetosky]

Playing devil's advocate, but wouldn't people that wanted to steal the nuclear material just get tipped off by trucks that are going weird and roundabout routes around towns with such a declaration?

It's the nature of shipping to take the fastest, most direct route possible to get somewhere with the cargo, so a truck that's taking its sweet time going around otherwise random assortment of towns could be noticed by someone looking for that.

[the_axel]

Wikipedia has the answer.

(the short form being 'no it doesn't 'cos the Feds can tell municipalities to go swivel).

[13chapters]

Thanks! And HA HA HA according to that, Santa Cruz became a nuclear free zone in 1998, which is not only well after I was born, but during the time I was a student there. (Although I was studying abroad at the time and don't recall hearing any discussion about it.) Once again, my coworker has made up a bunch of shit to make herself look knowledgeable about something. (Other things she's told me include how I should have dealt with mosquito bites in India, a place she's never been, and where I should have bought books in Bulgaria, where she's also never been. Naturally, none of her advice ever makes sense because she doesn't know what she's talking about.)

....I don't like my coworker.

[romp]

It's my understanding that's it's a symbolic action. I lived on a small island off the coast of BC which was a "nuclear free zone" and had no chance of these trucks passing through.

[13chapters]

Yeah, Santa Cruz is big on symbolic actions, heh. They also declared it to be a hate-free zone. Talk about things you can't enforce.

[romp]

Could they enforce it like Canada's hate speech laws?

I appreciate hippies but have found a little Santa Cruz goes a long way. :)

[13chapters]

Ahahah, no, since AFAIK Santa Cruz is still subject to the First Amendment.

Yeah, Santa Cruz was like SUPER COOL when I was eighteen and starting college, but by the time I graduated four years later, I felt well rid of the place. (It didn't help that I did my third year of college abroad in Israel, and coming back to a place where people will tell you in all seriousness that "all religions are the same, they're all about love" among other incredibly simplistic blahdy blah was uh, kind of irritating.)

[sleeky]

Haha, oh Santa Cruz. In reality all the nuclear free zone did was cost tax payer money because they had to keep replacing the signs as they got stolen more than any thing else in the county.