****** - Verified Buyer
4.5
This book has the format of a high school textbook. There isn't any math in it, but the cutaway diagrams are quite clear, showing the structure of the various nuclear plants that suffered meltdowns. There's even a diagram of the Fukushima Power Station in Japan, hard to find in a reasonably priced book. The disasters are described in enough detail to answer the lay-person's question of "What happened?" without getting too technical. Mahaffey avoids preaching about the morality of nuclear power, choosing instead to focus on a very readable introduction to nuclear disasters and what probably caused them.This is an excellent book, and very enjoyable to read. There is no math in it, so it is approachable to everyone. Every accident is clearly and succinctly described, as well as the exact events leading to the accident, the duration and effects of the accident, the consequences of the accident, and the radiation released.NUCLEAR ACCIDENTS AND DISASTERS is volume two of James Mahaffey's six-volume NUCLEAR POWER set published by Facts on File. Though the idea of nuclear power held great promise, the learning curve for the nuclear power industry was fairly steep and its safety track record over the past 60 years not what you'd called exemplary. NUCLEAR ACCIDENTS AND DISASTERS is a comprehensive summary of those 'Oops' moments when things went terribly wrong and catastrophe ensued.After discussing the development of a nuclear industry and early 'problems' with industrial use of radium, Mahaffey provides a chronological accounting of disasters or near-disasters including accidents, meltdowns and/or explosions at Canada's Chalk River labratory in 1952, the Naval Proving Ground in 1961, the Windscale (U.K.) Facility in 1957, the Mayak (USSR) Fuel Processing Plant in 1957, the Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station in 1978, the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in 1986, the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant in 2011, etc.Sometimes human error caused the accidents or faulty procedures or faulty equipment. Whatever the reason, the results were the same: lives lost, lives ruined and parts of surrounding countryside irradiated with some areas becoming uninhabitable. Mahaffey uses a fair amount of techno-babble in telling the tale yet his account of the various incidents nevertheless makes for compelling - and often frightening - reading.Each chapter is illustrated with b&w and color photographs and diagrams that help the reader understand the issues and procedures involved.Though NUCLEAR ACCIDENTS AND DISASTERS will be of greatest value to students writing reports, the drama inherent in those incidents and their impact should make Mahaffey's book of interest to the general reader. Recommended.The books on the theme of "Nuclear Power" by Dr James A. Mahaffey are Simplistic for the general "mind" level of a begining class for high school pupils...This book on the Nuclear Accidents and Disasters is also Simplistic and for the non-scientist/engineer...For more serious readers we want to recomment a book like the " Reactor Accidents: Nuclear Safety and the Role of Institutional Failure " byDavid Mosey , which also discuss the main cause in almost all nuclear accident the "HUMAN FACTOR"(anyone directlty or/and indirecly related to nuclear system(s)) and the David Mosey bookis from the few books that introduces in the Theme of THE ULTRA CRITICAL ROLE OF HUMAN MANAGEMENT IN NUCLEAR SYSTEMS & ORGANIZATIONS as it VITALY! concerns the INTERNATIONAL NUCLEAR SAFETY and NUCLEAR ACCIDENTS!...The LACK in the HUMAN MANAGEMENT of specialization of Nuclear Physics/Engineering , particularly specialized in Nuclear Fission, in the Nuclear Fission Installations and Organizations,Worldwide, is a HUGE! problem of the International Nuclear Safety!!!, including the International "Atomic"(Nuclear) Energy Agency (I."A".E.A.) , where the Presidents of its Board of Governors and its General Directors are from...Lawyers! to Master of Art graduate!(Painter?) WITH TOP DECISION POWER IN NUCLEAR SCIENCE/ENGINEERING & INTERNATIONAL NUCLEAR SAFETY!!!SOS,SOS,SOS,...From : Joseph-Christos Kondylakis , 17-August-2013,Author of the relevant scientific articles:1) "Theoretically and in Applied very special conditions a Nuclear Fission Reactor may explode as Nuclear Bomb",2010, available also from the Internet site:http://nuclpart.phys.uoa.gr/HNPS/Files/ANP2010.pdf2) "Human Management in Nuclear Systems",2001,2011
