-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Oct. 23, 1997
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------

NASA, Pentagon downplay risks of Cassini launch

What goes up . . .

By John Catalinotto

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the Department of Energy and the Pentagon are playing Russian roulette with humanity.

These agencies launched 73 pounds of deadly plutonium into space from Cape Canaveral, Fla., on Oct. 15 aboard the Cassini probe.

The Cassini probe’s stated goal is to send back scientific information, mainly about Titan, the earth-sized moon of Saturn. While full-time scientists, amateur astronomers and anyone curious about the universe might enjoy learning more about Titan, more and more people are asking, "At what cost?"

To the Pentagon, it must seem a small risk compared to the nuclear annihilation U.S. generals threatened over the past 50 years.

But protesters against the launch clearly understand the immense risk posed by the Cassini probe.

Twelve hundred people protested in Cape Canaveral on Oct. 4. Police arrested 27 people, including 11 members of Grandmothers for Peace, for trying to enter the launch site. Another 300 protested at Sen. James Jeffords’ office in Burlington, Vt.

On Oct. 11 another 300 people demonstrated in Cape Canaveral.

The potential cost to human life

With this launch, the cost is not just the few hundred million dollars to buy and use the equipment and personnel.

It involves a risk the space agency itself admits is at least one in 1,400 that an accident releasing radioactive material will occur. While this is better odds than the one in six of shooting yourself in Russian roulette, there’s more at stake here than one life.

Plutonium is the deadliest element known. Even minute amounts can cause deadly cancers. Medical radiation expert Dr. Helen Caldicott notes that even one pound of plutonium, if evenly distributed, could give a fatal case of lung cancer to every person on earth.

Of the 24 previous U.S. launches carrying nuclear material, three met with accidents. And Cassini has by far the greatest amount of plutonium, used in nuclear reactors to keep the rocket supplied with electricity for the duration of its seven-year trip.

Most protesters are not asking that the probe of Titan be completely stopped. They just want NASA and company to find an alternate source of power so that there is no longer a serious environmental risk.

Two Air Force generals, officials from NASA, the DOE, the European Space Agency and others held a news conference Oct. 10 to put a safe, confident spin on the expedition. One boasted he had invited his entire family, including grandchildren, to witness the launch. The overall attitude was nothing can go wrong.

No one mentioned the January 1986 Challenger launch, which millions of schoolchildren watched. It was supposed to be so safe that NASA officials invited a schoolteacher to participate in the flight. Then it exploded, killing all aboard.

And it’s not just on launch that the Cassini runs a risk. To get all the way to Saturn—almost a billion miles from the sun compared to Earth’s 93 million miles away from the sun—the Cassini rocket will first orbit nearby Venus and then fly within 312 miles of Earth at 42,000 miles per hour. Earth’s gravitational pull is supposed to add enough momentum to the rocket to sling it to Saturn.

If the rocket accidentally enters Earth’s atmosphere it will burn, dispersing plutonium worldwide.

- END -

(Copyright Workers World Service: Permission to reprint granted if source is cited. For more information contact Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail: ww@workers.org. For subscription info send message to: info@workers.org. Web: http://www.workers.org)

Copyright © 1997 workers.org