The public knowledge is currently available. But the media is very bad at reporting technical issues. They often don’t understand, or even want to understand, technical issues. They see engineering and science as “mechanic’s work” that they, as members of the 4th Estate, are above. And they often (mis) report things for their own reasons.

Two examples from first hand experience.

1) A truck driver was burned when he tried (stupidly) to walk across the tarp on a truck load of ash, and fell in. Flight for Life was called to rush him to a hospital (he survived). The TV news reported an explosion at the plant. When I called and asked the reporter, she said she had assumed that if someone was burned, there must have been an explosion. I asked if she had called to confirm her assumption, and was told no, she “didn’t have time”. I got the impression that an explosion sounded “sexy” and she wanted her story to air.

2) Shortly after the TV movie “The Day After” aired, a local university’s Student government voted to stockpile poison in case of nuclear war. The local TV news reported on this legitimate story. Immediately after, nothing between, they reported that the local utilities nuclear (fission) plant had “Run at full power for the last 30 days.” They had NEVER, to my knowledge, reported on the air that any plant had run with no problems for the last month. To my mind, the station’s news staff had wanted to tie nuclear power to nuclear war and death in the minds of the public. I called and spoke to the stations News Editor, and was told “it was never their intention to do that, it was COINCIDENCE”. He would not admit that they had any agenda against nuclear power. I told him that they had every right to editorial opinion, but that it should be aired as such, not put forth as innuendo. He hung up on me.