The latest DWR catalog arrived in the mail yesterday, and the Soto sleeper chair instantly caught my attention: After looking at the picture, I spotted the chair’s $3,300 price tag and quickly closed the catalog. No offense to the designers or the wonderful folks at DWR (it really is an attractive piece of furniture), but $3,300 is way above my price range. Sleeper chairs are fantastic additions in small spaces because they work double duty as seating and guest accommodations. One of these multitaskers in a living room or office is perfect when you don’t have a guest room or space for a larger sofa sleeper. My husband and I have been considering getting one for my son’s bedroom so that when his cousins or friends spend the night they won’t have to sleep on the floor, and he’ll have a comfortable space to sit and read the rest of the time. A little more in line with our price range are: For $130, Target has a single sleeper: For $20 more ($150), Target has a sleeper lounge chair:

JCPenny has the Sleepy sleeper chair for $500 that is available in nine different upholstery options: If a modern style is your preference, Amazon has a love seat option for $378: And, for $1,000, is the sleek Vincent twin sleeper from CB2: You don’t have to spend $3,300 or add a spare room onto your home to increase the number of sleeping accommodations you have to offer guests — a sleeper chair might be all you need for your small space. Updated: January 1, 2006 This publication is now archived. Could terrorists target U.S. nuclear power plants? How vulnerable are U.S. nuclear weapons sites? How might terrorists attack other U.S. nuclear facilities? What kind of damage could such attacks cause to a nuclear power plant? What would happen if a plane crashed into a nuclear plant? Have terrorists threatened specific nuclear plants?In his January 2002 State of the Union speech, President Bush said that U.S. forces “found diagrams of American nuclear power plants” in al-Qaeda materials in Afghanistan.

An al-Qaeda training manual lists nuclear plants as among the best targets for spreading fear in the United States. The government is taking the threat seriously: in February 2002, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) issued an advisory to the nation’s 103 nuclear power plants that terrorists might try to fly hijacked planes into some of them. back jack chair assemblyAnd eight governors have independently ordered the National Guard to protect nuclear reactors in their states.bean bags chairs india Not very, most experts say. which pushchair to buyNuclear weapons production and storage sites are guarded by security forces supervised by the Department of Energy. wooden chairs for sale cork

John Gordon, the administrator of the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration, has called such sites “one of the last places a terrorist would think about attacking and having hopes of success; the security basically bristles.” But a watchdog organization, the Project on Government Oversight (POGO), charged that security at U.S. nuclear weapons complexes was inadequate and that hundreds of tons of weapons-grade plutonium and highly enriched uranium could be stolen, sabotaged, or even detonated. red dining chairs melbourneThe Department of Energy dismisses such criticism, adding that security has been stepped up since September 11. red leather captains chair for saleExperts note that a terrorist looking to steal nuclear weapons or weapons-grade material would have a much easier time in Russia or Pakistan than in the United States.

U.S. homeland security planners are most concerned about the following scenarios: A massive release of radiation after a nuclear plant is hit with a bomb delivered by truck or boat. A September 11-type attack using a plane as a guided missile to crash into a nuclear facility. Sabotage at a nuclear facility by an insider or by intruders. A ground assault on a nuclear plant by a commando team attempting to blow up the plant. Suicide terrorists might also try to break in to a nuclear plant and quickly build and detonate a “dirty bomb”—a conventional explosive laced with radioactive material. Attackers could also use conventional explosives to blow up some nuclear waste or nuclear fuel, thereby spewing radioactive materials into nearby areas. Finally, experts warn that terrorists might target the pools in which nuclear reactors’ highly radioactive waste (“spent fuel”) is kept. This waste, which is kept cool by water, could ignite if exposed to the air. 

One nuclear expert, Robert Alvarez, has said that this would cause a “catastrophic fire” that could be “worse than a reactor meltdown.” Experts say that an attack on a nuclear power plant, all of which are guarded by private security forces hired by the plants and supervised by the NRC, couldn’t lead to a nuclear explosion. The danger, they say, is that attackers could cause a meltdown or a fire or set off a major conventional explosion, all of which could spew radiation into nearby cities and towns.U.S. nuclear power plants are built to withstand hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, and small plane crashes. Their “containment walls” are typically made of two to five feet of reinforced concrete with an interior steel lining. But the NRC didn’t anticipate the type of attacks seen on September 11—large passenger airliners loaded with fuel slamming into targets. Both the NRC and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) have said that U.S. nuclear plants were not designed to withstand such an impact, and the NRC has ordered a study of plant designs to look at what would happen in such a scenario.