Test conducted 6/25/98 by U.S. Army for International Fuel Containers, Ltd. (IFC) at Aberdeen Proving Grounds.
- IFC is U.S. agent for Gesellschaft für Nuclear-Behälter mbH (GNB), a large German cask manufacturer owned by the German utilities.
- The cask is GNB’s dual-purpose CASTOR cast-iron cask, used for transport and dry storage of spent nuclear fuel.(Some 600 casks are already in use worldwide, including in the U.S.)
- The weapon piercing the cask is a TOW anti-tank missile warhead.
- TOW missiles are 5 inches in diameter, less than 4 feet long, and weigh less than 50 pounds.They can be launched from a portable tripod launcher and have a range of over 3000 meters. TOW is the most widely distributed anti-tank guided missile in the world, with more than 500,000 built and in service in the U.S. and 36 other countries. (Iran may have obtained 1750 or more TOW missiles.) Source: Military Analysis Network.
- DOE has not yet specified the casks to be used to transport waste to Yucca Mountain, but CASTOR is currently one of the most (if not the most) robust cask in existence.Some environmental groups (e.g., NRDC) have argued it is the “Cadillac” of shipping casks.
- CASTOR is licensed by NRC for storage in the U.S., and a transport license is currently pending at NRC.The cask is licensed for storage and transport by numerous other countries.