Former EO here. Every group on the boats gets an unofficial name. My favorite was the A-ganger's, the guys that took care of all the mechanical stuff that no one else wanted like the sanitary tanks: Turd Ranchers. Still makes me laugh ...
I think it depends on what you call the reactor. I think of a reactor as the vessel that holds the fuel, moderator, controls, etc. From the NRX diagram, the reactor includes everything within the concrete "biological shield". Here's a link to the NRX reactor description:
The NRX was disassembled and rebuilt within a year. My guess is that Carter and others were lowered from the "revolving door" above the reactor in order to remove bolts as part of the disassembly process. The clothing worn was needed to protect the personnel from being contaminated.
> ... the dubious abilities of our nominally elite classes ... to competently mediate the difference between artifice and reality.
I wish there were more media introspection over how they fueled the hype. To me, the Theranos story of a 19-year old dropout revolutionizing blood testing technology was always suspect.
> in the coming years Intel will cease to buy back shares, but will invest in new manufacturing capacities instead.
This is critical for Intel's turnaround. Good to have a CEO that wants to put money into process engineering and capacity than financial engineering to pump up the stock price to meet his personal compensation goals.
Abba has always been the guilty pleasure that I'd never admit to my musician friends. Have to confess that I like their new song “I Still Have Faith In You”.
Both Pfizer and Moderna have stated that boosters will be needed this Fall. Pfizer says that immunity drops from 96% to 84% at the six month point. The good news is that the vaccine continues to protect against severe disease due to its effects on T-cells and memory B-cells.
> I would very much like to know your take on why the Navy has this knack.
I think the obvious answer is that they have to. The Navy has a lot of technology that needs maintenance at sea. Problem diagnosis requires understanding. We didn't rely on black box replacement.
I had nearly two years of engineering math when I was drafted and joined the Navy. The Navy skipped all of the derivations and went straight to the concepts of limits, derivatives, and integrals. Even some differential equations that describe reactor dynamics. Calculations were limited to algebra. Testing focused on calculus concepts rather than numerical answers.
This produced technicians with the ability to understand how the power plant worked but without the formal math and physics need for power plant design.
The only thing I can offer about how the Navy selects people is that it presents the various training programs early, starting with the recruiters. Certain programs are presented as being most difficult and are described in glowing terms. The challenge was definitely an attraction for me.
> 90% of the people I started training with were gone in the first two years!
My experience too. Do you remember the "skyhook"? We'd return to the barracks after class and find that the guy next to you had vanished without a trace.
My experience is from the Vietnam era and doesn't apply today. I was drafted mid-way through an EE program when I got behind in units. Virtually all of us had similar backgrounds. The Navy had a knack for teaching nuclear physics & math to bright people with a high school education.
The S5W plant that I operated had virtually no automation. Just safety interlocks and a few automatic shutdowns. Everything was analog. The electrical controls used mag-amps: dumb and inefficient, but reliable as hell. Safety was achieved by detailed operating procedures and highly trained crews. We studied and drilled constantly. Most over-qualified group of people I've known.
There's no way that I could describe what it was like at sea in a few lines here. It might make for an interesting HN thread as there are other nuc's here. :-)
Just once, briefly when he did an inspection of our boat in Guam. My last memory of him was standing next to the ladder as he left. His pants raised as his ankle reached my eye level exposing a leg that was smaller than my wrist. To me, this was a perfect example of Rickover: a giant in many respects, but small and petty in others.
I was a nuclear power plant operator on a submarine during this period. Wanting another challenge (young & crazy ...), I applied for duty at McMurdo Station in 1971. My request was not approved and I was told that the Navy had a shortage of qualified submarine nuc's. Sounds like the Navy had already decided to decommission it.
I've always regretted not going to Antarctica, but this article makes me think that I dodged a bullet. This plant was a maintenance nightmare. Plus, operating a reactor with a mix of personnel sounds bad. We certainly had our personnel issues on subs, but at least all of us in Engineering had the shared experiences of nuclear power school, prototype training, and sub qualification.
I remember these machines well. My father was a radiologist and wouldn't let us use them. He knew they were dangerous and the shoe sales people were unqualified.
As a side note, many of his fellow radiologists lost fingers because they didn't follow procedures using shields and lead gloves.