WE ALMOST LOST NEW YORK

We mean no disrespect to the several dead and dozens of injured (mostly firemen) when we say that accidents of this type are bound to happen in handling large amounts of energy, whatever form it is stored in. The press seemed to think so too, for outside New York, it paid only scant attention.

But there is one aspect of the blaze that escaped the media, who to this day wail about the March 1975 Browns Ferry fire (in which nobody was killed or injured and no radioactivity escaped). The dense smoke from an oil fire is, in one respect, very similar to a radiactive cloud that might escape from a reactor: Neither can lead to large loss of life unless there is a temperature inversion to trap them and a slight wind to blow the pollution into a large population center.

Would the death toll be comparable?

No, it wouldn't; the deaths from radioactivity would be fewer, and above all, there are no nuclear plants smack in the middle of Brooklyn, nor in any other large population center or even close to one.

Let the figures speak for themselves: The highest death toll even considered in the Rasmussen study is 3,300, with an unimaginably small probability of one in a billion per reactor year. But the death toll in air pollution disasters does not come from computer printouts; it is a matter of record:

In December 1952, the SO 2 level in London reached 1.5 ppm (indicating far less dense pollution than in the smoke from the Brooklyn blaze); the number of excess deaths within the following week amounted to 3,900. And it happened again and again. London, Jan.1956: 1,000. London, Dec.1962: 850. Osaka (Japan), Dec.1962: 60. New York City, Nov. 1966: 168 excess deaths.

Fortunately, the weather was favorable in the Brooklyn blaze, and aerial views of the giant black plume show it in air clear enough to see the city blocks stretching all the way to the horizon.

Has New York City published its evacuation plans? Does it have any? Would there have been PriceAnderson type of no-fault insurance? What was the liability limit guaranteed by the US government? (Zero.) Do oil tanks have several lines of defense against disaster? Why wasn't the emergency cooling system working? Why didn't a containment building contain the disaster? When can we expect a book called We Almost Lost New York? And a film called The Daedalos Asphyxiation?