The John Large Archive

in memory of the work of Dr John Large, consulting nuclear engineer

Nuclear Security

Vulnerability of Nuclear Power Plants to Drone Attack

Over the period from 14 September 2014 to 16 November a total of 31 overflights by unmanned aerial vehicles – drones – had taken place at 19 French nuclear installations, 14 of which were nuclear power plant (NPP) sites. The motivation for and purpose of the drone flights remain a mystery. The overflights are unauthorised and blatantly flout the restriction orders for airspace above and around NPPs and, of course, there are very serious nuclear safety and security implications. In view of the mounting public concern EdF, along with the national security and nuclear safety authorities, has not been able to anticipate, detect and deter the drone flights, nor identify and restrain the human perpetrators from continuing with this activity.

For obvious security reasons sections of the original report have been redacted in the publicly available version.

Redacted Report

Vulnerability of Nuclear Plants and Facilities to the Terrorist Threat

It is now established that in the recent past nuclear plants have been targeted by terrorists to create havoc in the public domain – this published paper considers the vulnerability of such plants to acts of terrorism.

Paper

Vulnerability of BNF Sellafield to Terrorist Attack

A terrorist cell charged with attacking Sellafield could readily obtain sufficient information from publicly available documents to identify highly hazardous and vulnerable targets on the Sellafield site for which there exists little defence in depth.

Using only publicly accessible points of information, LargeAssociates compile this chilling portend of a terrorist attack on the nuclear complex of Sellafield.

Abstract