Kodak Had a Secret Nuclear Reactor Loaded With Weapons-Grade Uranium Hidden In a Basement

Ugh. Not all "enriched uranium" is "weapons grade".

Woah. I stand corrected. It could have been weapons grade.

It had 1.5 Kg U-235 (unknown enrichment level). Little Boy had 64Kg.

haemaker: Kodak Had a Secret Nuclear Reactor Loaded With Weapons-Grade Uranium Hidden In a Basement

Ugh. Not all "enriched uranium" is "weapons grade".

Hush. You'll spoil the knee-jerk.

Spad31: haemaker: Kodak Had a Secret Nuclear Reactor Loaded With Weapons-Grade Uranium Hidden In a Basement

Ugh. Not all "enriched uranium" is "weapons grade".

Hush. You'll spoil the knee-jerk.

Or, he will read the article.

You can too! It's only one click away! Go on. You can do it!

Well, that would had been one way to get rid of the overabundance of cheap cameras from Japan.

"You Press the Button, We Do the Rest"
- old Kodak slogan

Indeed.

IT COULD HAVE BEEN HORRIBLE! IT COULD HAVE EXPLODED! THEY COULD HAVE STARTED A NUCLEAR WAR!!!

...except that it was very small, heavily guarded, and they didn't have all the other stuff you need to make a nuclear bomb except the plutonium, and since NOBODY KNEW about it, it could never have been broken into by terrorists etc. etc. etc. and all that other scary stuff.

Proving only that if you never tell anybody something, nobody will ever know about it. And ESPECIALLY the Feds.

But since everyone now knows about it, I'm sure we'll get lots of knee-jerk reactionary panic about what COULD HAVE HAPPENED OMFG!!!!! and now everyone within a 90-mile radius will come down with mysterious cancers, deformed babies and furtive men in turbans and kafiyehs even though the thing was dismantled five years ago.

But the Kennedy assassination couldn't be a conspiracy because secrets like that can't be kept.

Who will usher in the New World Order?

The UN controlled by The Illuminati, in league with Zionist Conspiracy, and Kodak.

/Got to go, its time for meds here at the home

Not having any background in nuclear engineering myself, I'm surprised they had that thing running for like 30 years without needing a full time staff of nuclear engineers to administer to it. Or, I would think at some point someone would have noticed a civilian camera company hiring people who specialized in running these sorts of equipment.

According to the company, no employees were ever in contact with the reactor. Apparently, it was operated by atomic fairies and unicorns

These atomic unicorns and fairies will enslave us all!!!11!

The NRC has absolute authority over civilian use/possession of nuclear materials in the US. Cities/states/etc. only have authority as designated by the NRC, so typically they have no reason to know about nuclear material. Would you go out of your way to alert the city council if you put up an FCC-authorized broadcast station in your basement?

WTF?

HotWingAgenda: Not having any background in nuclear engineering myself, I'm surprised they had that thing running for like 30 years without needing a full time staff of nuclear engineers to administer to it.

Having some (academic-only) experience in nuclear engineering, I'm sure they were registered with the NRC (google suggests they held license SNM-1513 for this material) and had someone officially in charge of the reactor. But realistically small-scale reactors (things that are safe with passive cooling) don't need any more maintenance than an oil tank -- someone should check occasionally to make sure it's not leaking, but otherwise it just sits there, and if it was built correctly it's safe for decades or even centuries.

The "no city officials knew" is a false flag; city officials have no authority over nuclear materials or reactors. The NRC had them on-file the whole time.

FTA: " In fact, nobody in the city-officials, police or firemen-or in the state of New York or anywhere else knew about it until it was recently leaked by an ex-employee. "

Bullshiat, I distinctly remember reading about a privately held nuclear reactor being decommissioned several years ago (about the time this one was). I think Gizmodo's 'journalists' (and that is the loosest use of the word ever and I can't use the word 'professional' else I'll start giggling) may not understand the concept of "Urban Myth" nor that a lot of them are founded in reality... to one degree or another.

Ohh and subby? FU for posting a link to a Gawker site.

It sounds to me like what they had was a neutron source device. Which, yes, there is a nuclear reaction taking place in there, but it's not what people think of when they hear 'reactor'.

Isn't this essentially a more sophisticated version of what that looney boy scout guy built by scavenging old smoke detectors?

why did Kodak have a hidden nuclear reactor loaded with weapons-grade uranium?

To aid in the developement of a machine that would allow transport far enough back in time to murder an ancestor of the inventor of the digital camera, no doubt.

Not so far back that people wouldnt give a crap however.

profplump: The "no city officials knew" is a false flag; city officials have no authority over nuclear materials or reactors. The NRC had them on-file the whole time

OK. Then I'm getting a Ghost Busters vibe from this.

/Everything was fine with our system until the power grid was shut off by dickless here.
//Yes, it's true. This man has no dick.

Why does Fark greenlight submissions from people that are illiterate?

Didn't you guys invade a country for less than that?

aniyn: Didn't you guys invade a country for less than that?

Quiet, you.

But why did Kodak have a hidden nuclear reactor loaded with weapons-grade uranium? And how did they get permission to own it, let alone install it in a basement in the middle of a densely populated city?

Nobody really knows.
....
Kodak's purpose for the reactor wasn't sinister: they used it to check materials for impurities as well as neutron radiography testing

I would find it very strange if nobody really knew why Kodak had this and I'm sure someone at Kodak as well as the NRC knows how they got permission to have it.

A more detailed article: The existence of the device was not, strictly speaking, a secret.

It had been mentioned many years ago in research papers and was referred to obliquely in a half-dozen public documents on a federal website, though none hinted where it was located.

"It was a known entity, but it was not well-publicized," said Albert Filo, a former Kodak research scientist who worked with the device for nearly 20 years.

Strange. I know Cf is used for both neutron radiological camera use, and for starting small reactors. But 1.5kg of U235? That's nothing. Maybe used as a reflector? I sure would like to know more about this.

Ahhhhh....and only two made. A rare puppy indeed.

"The CFX was a sub-critical assembly of uranium-235 surrounding a Cf-252 source.
The function of the U-235 fuel was to multiply the neutrons coming from the Cf-252
source, which fissions spontaneously. The CFX was designed never to exceed a Keif of
0.99. The CFX assembly yielded sufficient neutron fluxes for applications such as
neutron activation analysis."

Pointy Tail of Satan: Strange. I know Cf is used for both neutron radiological camera use, and for starting small reactors. But 1.5kg of U235? That's nothing. Maybe used as a reflector? I sure would like to know more about this.

I would bet money that kodak was working on projects for the military, like maybe coming up with film that could be used in close proximity to reactors or something like that. Either that or they used it to perfect the chemical components used in their film.

See? THIS is why we shouldn't get involved in a land war in Asia.

/or something

//wishes I had my own reactor. I could use it to find the Crystal Key.

Kodak - the price of complacency in changing technology. Crap management strikes again but, hey, lets blame the workers.

Gyrfalcon: IT COULD HAVE BEEN HORRIBLE! IT COULD HAVE EXPLODED! THEY COULD HAVE STARTED A NUCLEAR WAR!!!

...except that it was very small, heavily guarded, and they didn't have all the other stuff you need to make a nuclear bomb except the plutonium, and since NOBODY KNEW about it, it could never have been broken into by terrorists etc. etc. etc. and all that other scary stuff.

Proving only that if you never tell anybody something, nobody will ever know about it. And ESPECIALLY the Feds.

But since everyone now knows about it, I'm sure we'll get lots of knee-jerk reactionary panic about what COULD HAVE HAPPENED OMFG!!!!! and now everyone within a 90-mile radius will come down with mysterious cancers, deformed babies and furtive men in turbans and kafiyehs even though the thing was dismantled five years ago.

HotWingAgenda: /Everything was fine with our system until the power grid was shut off by dickless here.

If the system requires power for safe operation they're required to have on-site generation capabilities or other similar backups.

Fascinating read here on the Kodak CFX if you have any interest in nuclear engineering.

Link

Pointy Tail of Satan: Ahhhhh....and only two made. A rare puppy indeed.

"The function of the U-235 fuel was to multiply the neutrons coming from the Cf-252
source, which fissions spontaneously."

Whoever named Californium had a dry, and wicked, sense of humor.

/or is it me?

According to documents related to NRC SNM-1513, the State of New York knew about it to: "The Californium source was licensed by the State of New York under Kodak's license number 1347-0255."

Having been born and bred in Rochester...this could explain a lot vis a vis the locals (self included) And calling Rochester a "densely populated city" seems, well, hopeful at best. No surprise that no one knew it was there, Kodak Park during the day was it's own entity. Now it's just blocks and blocks of sad and empty buildings.

For all I know it was the furnace in my parents basement

You know, if Kodak's campus is left abandoned, this is going to be a mecca for Urban exploration! Damn! Why did the Toronto/Rochester ferry have to close down????

So, what about the reactor in Cambridge MA? Or is that alright . . .

profplump: The NRC has absolute authority over civilian use/possession of nuclear materials in the US. Cities/states/etc. only have authority as designated by the NRC, so typically they have no reason to know about nuclear material.

Well, for reactors, yes. But if the state is an NRC "Agreement State" then they license the non-reactor facilities. Looks like there are currently 36 Agreement States. I remember our local school system had a seed irradiator, I can't remember if it was Cs-137 or Co-60.

Would you go out of your way to alert the city council if you put up an FCC-authorized broadcast station in your basement? See: all the fights over cell-tower zoning.

As for radioactive-related stuff, Kodak and Fuji both sell (or sold) industrial x-ray film for use in industrial radiography. Not unlicensed particle accelerators, but plenty of folks running around with Ir-192 sources.

WOW, the writer of this is retarded. It is physically impossible for nuclear power fuel to be used to make nuclear warheads (exception being dirty bombs).

TomD9938:
To aid in the developement of a machine that would allow transport far enough back in time to murder an ancestor of the inventor of the digital camera, no doubt

Kodak invents a time machine so they can go and kill a Kodak employee in the 1970's? Ya know something? Still better than reality TV, go write a script.

profplump: The NRC has absolute authority over civilian use/possession of nuclear materials in the US. Cities/states/etc. only have authority as designated by the NRC, so typically they have no reason to know about nuclear material. Would you go out of your way to alert the city council if you put up an FCC-authorized broadcast station in your basement?

Practically speaking, should something happen (fire, flood, quake, etc...) the state authorities would probably be on scene first.
They might have appreciated the heads up.

I more find it to be another example of pitting what people think they know VS what actually happens.
People think that nuclear material is all weapons grade and tightly controlled by an all knowing government. What happens is individuals and companies with deep connections can get anything they want, above or below the table. Because heavy elements have many uses, people want for many varieties of it.

/Yes, you can own a nuke Virginia.
/You just need deep pockets.

Unobtanium: See: all the fights over cell-tower zoning.

Those are all about things like tower height and appearance though, not about the radio emissions.

WireFire2: WOW, the writer of this is retarded. It is physically impossible for nuclear power fuel to be used to make nuclear warheads (exception being dirty bombs).

THANK you. Not only is it not enough material, fuel is generally in a matrix/mix that is incompatible with weaponization (disclaimer: I am used to PWR Reactors, not something like this, which looks to just be a fancy neutron source).

way south: People think that nuclear material is all weapons grade

Sadly, most folks do think this, while in fact, almost all isn't.

way south: and tightly controlled by an all knowing government.

However, the NRC (and NNSA) do keep pretty close tabs on enriched sources, "weapons grade" or not.

WireFire2: WOW, the writer of this is retarded. It is physically impossible for nuclear power fuel to be used to make nuclear warheads (exception being dirty bombs).

See also: Navy reactor fuel

I think I know where Kodak got the nuclear material in the first place.

Amazon.com

This product page has been around a long time... probably longer than Kodak itself. (just kidding, time trolls)

If you have not yet seen this, read the reviews. They're awesome.

way south: Practically speaking, should something happen (fire, flood, quake, etc...) the state authorities would probably be on scene first.
They might have appreciated the heads up.

As noted above, the State of New York did know.

And the plethora of security and safety locks, placards, and other deterrents probably would have tipped them off even if the state didn't know. If standard emergency crew training doesn't include "don't break locks to go places that warn of eminent personal danger" we've got bigger problems than a lack of industry coordination.

There is also supposed to be a nuclear reactor at the University of ..&@z#*(((( *NO CARRIER*

I was born and raised in Rochester, and this doesn't surprise me in the least. It seemed that Kodak had hands in to everything. I remember a field trip to see a massive furnace they had for incinerating all their trash.

/Sad to see Kodak go under

Huh, I wonder if it's under the mysterious grassy knoll not that far from my apartment.

And there's a reason you don't drink the city water around here...

It seems like the fire department would have wanted a heads-up.

SharkInfested: Having been born and bred in Rochester...this could explain a lot vis a vis the locals (self included) And calling Rochester a "densely populated city" seems, well, hopeful at best. No surprise that no one knew it was there, Kodak Park during the day was it's own entity. Now it's just blocks and blocks of sad and empty buildings.

Been a while since you visited? They are tearing down all those sad buildings ... http://rocwiki.org/Kodak_Park