New research suggesting that the area around Sizewell could be successfully evacuated in two-and-a-half hours if there was a meltdown at the nuclear power station has been labelled “ridiculous” by critics. Emergency planning officers say the plan is based on a worst case scenario with a toxic radiation plume over Leiston and the need for people to reach the A12. They believe they will have up to 12 hours to warn people if there is a serious incident at Sizewell B because the plant has some of strongest containment systems and defences in the world to deal with a melted core. However, Pete Wilkinson, deputy chairman of the Sizewell Stakeholder Group (SSG), questioned the validity of the planned response, which suggests it would take two-and-a-half to three hours to evacuate up to 6,000 people from a zone of a radius of four kilometres from Sizewell B. He said: “This plan would be incapable of being put into practice. It is absolutely ridiculous to say people could get out of that area.”
East Anglian Daily Times 10th July 2017 read more »