The UK’s two armed nuclear ships sailed from the port of Barrow-in-Furness at midday today (Friday 27th February) bound for Cherbourg. The Pacific Heron and Pacific Pintail, both operated by Pacific Nuclear Transport Limited (PNTL) are due in the French port within the next few days to collect a cargo of plutonium MOX fuel produced in France for onward transport to Japan.
Although carrying no cargo when they left Barrow’s Ramsden Dock, both ships carried armed security crews drawn from the UK’s Civil Nuclear Constabulary. Both the Pacific Heron and Pacific Pintail are fitted with 20mm naval canon and will act as escort to each other on the non-stop journey from France to Japan. Depending on the sea route taken, the transport will travel some 20,000km.
The ships are expected to load 11 transport containers at Cherbourg. At around 100 tonnes each, the containers will hold 65 MOX fuel elements which include 1.8 tonnes of plutonium. – the largest shipment of nuclear weapon’s useable material yet made. As a material of prime interest to terrorists, the plutonium cargo requires the ships to be armed and to carry the security crews. Fabricated at the Marcoule plant in the south of France, the MOX fuel is destined for three separate nuclear power stations in Japan – Kyusu Electric’s Genkai plant, Shikoku Electric’s Ikata and Chubu Electric’s Hamaoka.
CORE campaigner Martin Forwood said today:
“The weaponry and armed guards on these ships confirms the highly dangerous nature of their cargos. Shipping this plutonium at a time of heightened risk of terrorist activity around the world is an act of gross irresponsibility by the nuclear industry, and it is right that such transports are increasingly condemned internationally”.
The Pacific Heron is the latest addition to the PNTL, arriving in Barrow just last summer from a Japanese shipyard. The Pacific Pintail has been involved previously in the contentious shipment of plutonium, including the one and only shipment to Japan of Sellafield-produced MOX fuel in 1999. Following the disclosure that the quality assurance data relating to that fuel had been falsified by Sellafield workers, the fuel was rejected by Japan and returned to Sellafield in 2003 at significant cost to BNFL.