Citizens Protecting Ohio
Stop the Cassini Space Probe
Reprinted from WIND-WILPF: Women Insist on Nuclear Disarmament, and Nuclear Abolition Sisters
What Is It?
The Cassini Space Probe is a plutonium-powered solar system exploration vehicle. It is designed to reach Saturn and send back information about that distant planet. To reach Saturn the Probe will perform a complicated maneuver -- flying first from Earth to Venus and then back in a kind of slingshot flyby of Earth orbit, using the flyby to gain momentum for its trip to Saturn.
Radiation health effects expert, Helen Caldicott, points out that plutonium is so toxic that even one pound, if evenly distributed, could give a fatal case of lung cancer to every person on Earth. The Cassini Probe is powered by 72 pounds of plutonium-238, a radioactive isotope that is 280 times more radioactive than the plutonium-239 used in atomic weapons and usually found in nuclear waste!
During its flyby, the Cassini Probe will whip around the Earth going 42,000 miles per hour and come as close as 312 miles above the Earth's surface. According to NASA's own environmental impact statement, "If Cassini makes an 'inadvertent' re-entry into the Earth's atmosphere during the flyby and breaks up, dispersing plutonium, approximately five billion of the estimated 7-8 billion people living on the planet could receive 99% or more of the radiation exposure." Even if Cassini is safely launched, the probe will return to orbit Earth two years from now.
Illegal Nukes in Space
Cassini is part of a dangerous and illegal plan which NASA has been building for years: "Nukes in Space," a new market for the post cold war nuclear industry. For years, NASA has ignored safer alternatives in favor of promoting nuclear technology. The first small SNAP reactors have involved RTGs (Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators) such as Cassini. The next planned steps are larger reactors called "Timberwinds."
Over the next 12 years, NASA plans to launch more than a dozen plutonium space missions. Mining colonies on Mars are now being planned for 2007, to be powered by nuclear reactors; and NASA and the Pentagon are planning full-scale nuclear powered battle stations in space, to be used as part of a space "defense strategy". The nuclear industry is clearly moving to develop a new market in space, and the US is marking its turf in the race toward the nuclearization and militarization of space. All of this is in blatant violation of the UN International and Space Treaty of 1996.
The history of this Nukes in Space program has been riddled with accidents and cover-ups: 3 out of 24 US space missions and 6 out of 39 known Russian missions involving nuclear materials met with accidents.
A Safe Alternative Exists
Meanwhile, a safe alternative for powering missions like Cassini does exist. The European Space Agency has already developed highly efficient solar cell technology for deep space missions. Solar cells could provide 745 watts of electricity that Cassini requires to power the instruments aboard the probe. Most of NASA's Earth orbit satellites already use solar power and several studies have indicated that deep space missions such as the Cassini mission could be powered by solar cells.
The Russian Mars Probe Precedent
Fears about a misadventure with Cassini are now founded in recent events. On November 17, 1996, the Russian Mars Probe carrying a half-pound of plutonium came crashing down along a 200-mile swath of Chile and Bolivia.
The US Space command was worried that the Probe might crash in Eastern or Central Australia and set off a flurry of media attention. On November 18, it was reported that the Probe had landed "harmlessly" in the ocean, and that was the end of story as far as the media was concerned.
Even is this report were true, it would be cause for alarm. It is difficult to imagine how the release of a half-pound of plutonium into the ocean could be without deadly consequences. However, the truth is even more dire. On November 29, the US space command admitted that the Probe had vaporized in a fireball and disintegrated over a highly populous of South America.
Racism and Spacism
Somehow, actual radiation exposure and damage in Chile and Bolivia was not as big a story in the media as the possible threat to Australia. When investigators called a press conference about the dangerous incident, only two of the previously deeply concerned reporters showed up. The New York Times refused to print an op-ed by Helen Caldicott and buried the report about the crash in the "World News Briefs" column far away from the front page coverage the story was granted when the target was thought to be Australia. The question posed by Manuel Baquedano, director of the Institute for Ecological Policy in Chile, "Are the lives of Australians worth more?" hangs unanswered by the media and the US space command. Racism and Spacism (the desire to justify the military exploitation of outer space) are the only likely explanations.
Clear and Present Danger
The Cassini Probe is scheduled to be launched in October of 1997 and to perform its perilous flyby of Earth in 1999. Given the history of similar probes and the amount of deadly plutonium expected to be part of Cassini, this project represents a clear and present danger. It must be stopped in its tracks.
Action
Contact President Clinton and urge him to cancel the Cassini launch and all other plutonium-powered, space exploration vehicles:
Pres. Bill Clinton
The White House
Washington DC 20500
202-456-1111
Fax: 202-456-2461
Revised: 9/1/97
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