Protesters heading to intercept a shipment of British nuclear fuel on its way to Cumbria say they will not impede the course of two armed ships.


The radioactive material, which was rejected by Japan, is being approached by a flotilla of anti-nuclear campaigners led by the Greenpeace vessel Rainbow Warrior.

Greenpeace activist Mhairi Dunlop, on board the Rainbow Warrior, said they were determined to carry out a "peaceful protest".

Map of Irish Sea area
The transport could pass Ireland or Wales

The British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL) shipment has caused protests around the world since setting off from Japan on its 18,000-mile voyage in July.

It is the first transport of its kind since the 11 September attacks on the United States.

Environmental groups and governments of countries the shipment passed feared the MOX - mixed uranium and plutonium oxide fuel - could prove a tempting target for terrorists on the high seas.

Ms Dunlop said: "The international trade in plutonium must stop.

"It is unnecessary, it is not wanted and it is not needed.

"We will be peacefully protesting against the two nuclear freighters. We will not be impeding the safe navigation of either ship but we will make sure that the ships see us."

A second flotilla of protest yachts was heading for Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria, to meet the shipment at its destination.

Security risk

BNFL's marine transport head Malcolm Miller, said: "We recognise that individuals and groups have the right to peacefully and lawfully protest about our activities.

The company said it expected the two ships, the Pacific Teal and Pacific Pintail, to reach Barrow-in-Furness around 0900 BST on Tuesday.

A spokeswoman for BNFL said the shipments did not pose a security risk.

She said: "We've been carrying out these kind of radioactive transports for 30 years in complete safety and security."

Another protesters, Des Llewellyn from Pembrokeshire, who is sailing on the Elkstone, said: "This shipment poses a huge security threat to the Irish Sea. There is now more chance of an attack on a nuclear facilty of vessel since September 11.

"The UK government are making it easier for terrorists to make that attack by shipping nuclear material around the world."

Nuclear fuel container being lifted
Container flasks like this carry nuclear fuel

Irish pop star Jim Corr, from the group The Corrs, is one of the protesters onboard the Greenpeace flagship vessel Rainbow Warrior.

The ships are part of a purpose-built fleet carrying more than 200 kilos of mixed oxide nuclear fuel destined for BNFL at the Sellafield reprocessing plant.

The cargo of fuel, which came from Sellafield originally, has been sent back from Takahama in Japan after safety records at the plant operated by BNFL were exposed as false in 1999.

Mixed-oxide fuel is made by reprocessing spent uranium fuel rods from nuclear plants.

The Sellafield plant separates the rods' plutonium radioactive waste from the remaining unused uranium.

Recycled uranium and plutonium is made into ceramic pellets which can be used again in a nuclear power plant.

BNFL said one fingernail-sized pellet could generate as much energy as a ton of coal

caption 1 map
caption 2 Container flasks like this carry nuclear fuel
caption 3 The Pacific Pintail is manoeuvred by a tug.