The Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant is three miles from Massachusetts and a stone's throw from New Hampshire. A major accident or act of sabotage at the reactor would kill thousands of people and leave an area the size of the Valley uninhabitable. Such a disaster is so likely that no insurance company will insure the facility; taxpayers would pay the costs of a meltdown. The hundreds of tons of nuclear waste at Vermont Yankee is the most toxic material on earth. The waste is so dangerous that it must be guarded 24 hours a day for the next 1 million years, according to the federal government. The electricity from Vermont Yankee is not needed, according to the state of Vermont, which last year ordered Entergy, the Louisiana company that owns Yankee, to close the plant in March 2012. Entergy is suing Vermont in federal court. The company wants a judge to force the state to let Vermont Yankee run until at least 2032.

Anti-nuclear activists are planning a rally at Vermont Yankee on October 30 at noon, said Claire Chang. The public is invited. Chang is a spokeswoman for the Shelburne Falls-based Citizens Awareness Network www.NukeBusters.org

Vermont Yankee is across the street from the public elementary school at 381 Governor Hunt Road in Vernon, Vermont.

There's a Facebook page for the rally at:

www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=123667794406300

More information about Vermont Yankee, and the mass movement that led the state to order Entergy to close the reactor, is at:

www.ValleyPost.org/2011/03/14/japan-quake-puts-valley-nuke-local-spotlight