4/20/07

Come and enjoy Spring-do not forget the idodine pills...

to Mr. Ken Plumley,
Ken.Plumley@state.ma.us

Dear Mr. Plumley:

Please come to western Massachusetts and enjoy
this glorious spring in the Valley. I'm writing to ask
for a public meeting at Frontier High School in South Deerfield,
at the Sunderland Library, or at Amherst High School. We wish
to discuss evacuation routes during any emergency, availability
of Potassium Iodine (replacing out-of-date supplies), advance warnings
about the ingestion of contaminated water from reservoirs in a 50-mile
radius of the Entergy Nuclear reactor in Vernon, Vermont, and other
related safety issues. Local and regional hazards include rail cargo,
Haz-Mat truck cargoes, and most prominently, the Vernon nuclear
reactor in Vernon, VT., currently operating at 20% above design capacity
(higher speeds in the turbine, higher water pressure in the reactor vessel,
higher temperatures and lower margins of error).

I write in also in support of neighbors in Gill, Greenfield, Bernardston,
Leyden, and Colrain, MA in the close 10-mile radius, who are concerned
about out-of-date KI that will not protect them, (and their especially
vulnerable children and elders) from the thyroid diseases likely
after any accidental release of radioactive iodine. For 22 years we were
lucky that the emergency cooling pumps weren't needed at Vernon.
They would not have been adequate to overcome the pressure in the
reactor vessel. We're still counting on good luck, but would like to
do so in an informed way, to best spare our youth undue harm,
to the best or our abilities.

After New Orleans we know better that to trust our futures
to F.E.M.A. Please call or write to tell us WHEN we can meet in
Deerfield, Sunderland, or Amherst. It's important that we meet
before school is out.

School administrators responsible during a crisis, need to understand
how slowly, accurate radiation monitoring will be available to them, in their
precise locale, in order to assess the relative risks of evacuation and
sheltering in place in masonry structures. Please come to western
Massachusetts and enjoy this glorious spring in the Valley. Please
respond if you can by Thursday, April 26, 2007, the 21st anniversary
of the Chernobyl disaster.

Now, the existence of US plans concerning how to bomb Iran's
fledgling reactor facilities near Natanz, put each of our 103 US
reactors at risk of retaliation. Our reactors sit with tons of fission
products on site--sitting ducks. Here is the real nuclear threat, in our
midst. (Joseph Gerson will discuss his new book, 'Empire and the Bomb',
this Monday evening in Amherst, explaining that every President
since Truman has threatened to use nuclear weapons.) Indeed,
the real threats are here, in our midst. We have paid for nuclear
war. Now please help us cope rationally and realistically,
understanding our options.

Sincerely,
Sunny Miller, 413-773-7427
Traprock Peace Center, 103A Keets Rd, Deerfield, MA 01342

http://www.TraprockPeace.org