HOME | DD

Description

Based on the Army "Fullback" powered armor suit, the AEB's "Rescue Suit" was designed to allow Liquidation Battalions to work directly in radioactive "hot zones" in the event of a core breach of nuclear reactors. Due to its use of atomic energy as a major backbone of the Gallan electric grid (nearly 70% percent of power c. 2025 and over 80% by 2080), the AEB is responsible for large amounts of the economic output of the country, at least indirectly. Although considered a minor risk due to the construction standards of Gallan concrete sarcophagi, the threat of nuclear core breach by "nefarious elements" or enemy action remained a distant possibility after natural disasters (earthquakes, due to Galla's position on the Ring of Fire, were considered the prime threat to reactors) and accidents such as automobiles on grounds crashing into a containment vessel. Relatively few incidents of such nature had taken place in the world at the time (late 2030's), with the most notable nuclear reactor occurring in in Ta Yue (Great Jade) Empire in the 2010's, with the bulk of radiation flowing out to sea in contaminated coolant water or drifting over broadly uninhabited mountainous terrain.

Regardless, historical accidents with nuclear reactors were the prime concern of the Liquidation Battalions: the Royal Army's Standard Modular Type 1 (SM1) reactor being one of the most important case studies.

Operated in conjunction with the then-nascent Army Atomic Corps and AEB contractors from Gallan Electric AB as a training reactor, the containment very nearly suffered a meltdown during a routine maintenance operation on New Year's Day, 1963. Operators from the AAC were preparing for restart by adjusting positions of the control rods after a fortnight of downtime over Christmas (a procedure at the time done manually, as the SM1 was designed for austere environments). Due to a design oversight, the reactor's control rods required manual withdrawal several inches to be reconnected to the hydraulic, automatic control system. Corporal Joachim Axelsson was in charge of this. Naval Reactor Corps Atomic Boilerman 1st Class (AB1) Adam Svensson was monitoring the situation nearby, while a Sergeant L. Luejtens was watching from the doorway, and Lance Corporal A. Monet maintained watch over CCTV from the control room. It is unclear what caused the incident, as video footage appears to show Corporal Axelsson having some difficulty with the rod. As AB1 Svensson moves to assist, the rod suddenly becomes free and jolts upward nearly two feet. Axelsson and Svensson are seen exchanging surprised glances before the top of the boiler flies off, covering the reactor room in a thick, radioactive fog. The resulting increase in output power, from a sedate 2 MW to well in excess of 20 GW ("excursion"), immediately superheated the coolant water, sending a large slug of semi-liquid water upwards to the top of the reactor vessel. In less than three seconds this slug impacts the top of the boiler, sending it upwards into the air and killing both men instantly. Sgt. Luejtens is last seen slowly backing away from the doorway at the edge of the camera frame before the reactor detonates.

Immediately, temperature alarms go off in the control room, with LCpl Monet phoning a nearby fire station. The temperature alarms, monitored remotely by a Gallan Electric AB station, also result in a response from the contractor's maintenance team, although the operator only receives a busy tone for the next four minutes despite multiple redials. Approximately eight minutes after the initial 112 call, firemen came within sight of the station and were met outside by LCpl Monet. Also at this time, the monitoring station, unable to raise the reactor control room by telephone, dispatched several technicians in a truck to check on the crew. The firemen, wearing equipment similar to modern liquidators (dust masks and painter's suits), initially attempted to enter the main containment hall by turned back as their Geiger counters clicked "out of control", topping nearly 300 rads, although several firemen managed to get a look down the reactor hall, noticing that the large lead door was still partially open and steam was clearly visible emanating from the silo where the reactor was housed. A body, later identified as Sergeant Lars Luejtens, was reported as well, with no sign of either AB1 Svensson or Cpl Axelsson. The firemen returned outside in time to see the GEAB maintenance truck pull up.

Physicist Jens Akersson took immediate command of the situation, questioning Monet as to the whereabouts of the rest of the reactor crew, who responded that they were still inside the containment silo. One of the firemen mentioned they'd seen someone on the ground outside the reactor room. Physicist Akersson, later noting that the firemen "were wholly unprepared" to deal with radiation, picked the most experienced man of the group to accompany him into the structure to look for survivors. The other two maintenance techs, armed with water buckets and mops, ordered the firemen and LCpl Monet to strip down to their skivvies and washed them clean of radioactive dust and contamination, despite the freezing temperatures outside.

Wielding a Geiger counter, Phys. Akersson and fireman de Oises navigated to the reactor hall much more rapidly, Akersson reportedly saying "time is life". de Oises, while noting the injuries of Sergeant Luetjens, determined that he was still alive despite multiple scalding burns after Luetjens "groaned" when he touched him. Akersson took a glance around the reactor room, pointing out the shrapnel shredded body of AB1 Svensson slumped against a wall, and the pair rapidly withdrew. Outside, Akersson ordered that an ambulance be called in from the nearby town, "tell them to bring a lead coffin", while he and de Oises "suited up" with lead aprons, rescue air packs, and a stretcher. Two other fireman, not part of the initial three who entered, Llewellyn Larsson and Lt. Jan Pehrsson, accompanied them. As Akersson, de Oises, Pehrsson, and Larsson re-entered the structure, the firemen, suitably washed down and their clothes "tossed in a trash bin" were quickly redressed in GEAB jumpsuits and split into two teams to map out the radioactive contamination of the site. One team swept the nearby office building where the control room was, while another monitored the roadway and exterior of the building, using Geiger counters, under supervision of the GEAB maintenance technicians.

12 minutes after Akersson and de Oises entered the building, an ambulance. Six minutes later, two additional fire trucks and a small convoy of GEAB and AEB emergency vehicles arrived. A cordon was rapidly established around the reactor and the GEAB contractor team quickly determined that there were no more people needing evacuation, while the AEB on-site emergency coordinator established a field telephone line back to the GEAB monitoring station, which connected him to the regional AEB office. Twenty minutes after entering the reactor, Akersson and de Oises emerged with the still-living Sergeant Luetjens, while Pehrsson and Larsson carried out the shrapnel riddled corpse of AB1 Svensson. AB1 Svensson was placed in the coffin, while Sergeant Luetjens was rushed to the hospital aboard the ambulance. Despite these life-saving measures, Sergeant Luetjens would succumb to his injuries several hours later. For their efforts, Fireman de Oises and Physicist Akersson were awarded the AEB Merit Ribbon, a precursor to the Liquidator Ribbon.

Recovering the body of Cpl Axelsson would require the removal of portions of the silo and reactor fan assembly, which took another eight weeks for the Army Engineering Corps to establish a plan of action, and for the Atomic Force to rail/road transport a prototype, 90-ton, self-moving crane (originally designed for maintenance of nuclear powered jet bombers) equipped with cutting torches and robotic arms, to allow the Engineering Corps to proceed with work in the "hot zone" surrounding the reactor. Despite requiring nearly a month to be removed, Cpl Axelsson's body showed no signs of decomposition at time of recovery. Phys. Jens Akersson, an employee of the AEB, would also oversee the health physics aspects of the three-phased recovery/demolition operation and testify before the Royal Diet with regards to the radioactive contamination of the area.

After the SM1 incident, the AEB established Atomic Emergency Cadres in all Gallan provinces with nuclear reactors, with immediate response capability within 12 hours of a reactor casualty, and emergency coordination between civil emergency responders and military engineering troops. First responder training for response to reactors would also increase, as the AEB successfully lobbied for nuclear energy during the fossil fuel "grid phaseout" of the 1970's and '80's, resulting in modern Liquidation Battalions, which unified the first responder training and the Cadres, alleviating local fire departments of the need to train for something so rare and unlikely to occur. As a result, semi-independent Liqudation Battalions train to evacuate the reactor site first, and establish an armed cordon of AEB Police officers while local emergency responders evacuate civilians downwind of an accidental release of radioactive compounds.

Additionally, firefighters of the Wildlife and Forest Service of the Ministry of the Interior maintain battalions of woodland rescue troops equipped with long-range rocket launchers, converted main battle tanks and APCs, and fire bombers, for use in firestorms. These rescue troops have often been incorporated into reactor emergency exercises by the Liquidation Battalions to provide simulated firefighting capacity due to their use of surplus military equipment and training to fight in oxygen starved environments such as near woodland and suburban (atomic) firestorms.

The liquidator suit depicted is standard issue of the AEB Liquidation Battalions circa 2039. The suit replaces the internal metal hydrides with lead, and is constructed from depleted uranium (as opposed to aluminum-titanium) casts and forgings, being substantially heavier than the Army Fullback suit. Operaitng with an internal oxygen supply due to its use of a fuel cell, the Rescue Suit is piloted by a liquidator wearing the standard painter's smock and full-face dust mask that has been common to AEB inventory for nearly 50 years, as well as commercially available kitchen tabi and gloves for protection of the feet from radioactive liquids and sprays. A connector is also provided through the mask for the liquidator to drink from a backpack worn water bladder. The suit allows the rescuer to traverse deep into a hot zone, performing construction work using specialized equipment (jackhammers or large shovels) or for rescue of injured or incapacitated workers in partially collapsed structures, using a combination of its powerful lifting capability and bright searchlight. The sturdy construction provides protection against both radiation and fall debris, such as pipes or concrete, while the flashing purple lights indicate the tell-tale signs of a radiation emergency in the Gallan emergency services markings.

The liquidator suits, along with their cousins in firefighting services, remain in general civil emergency use even after the Dorestad Incident/Alarian War. Many of these suits remain functional as, since the 2080's both the Royal Army and National Police Bureau have fully divested themselves of the Fullback body armor suit, emptying its inventory to the rest of the government which has rapidly snapped up the suits to cannibalize for spare parts.

Description

Based on the Army "Fullback" powered armor suit, the AEB's "Rescue Suit" was designed to allow Liquidation Battalions to work directly in radioactive "hot zones" in the event of a core breach of nuclear reactors. Due to its use of atomic energy as a major backbone of the Gallan electric grid (nearly 70% percent of power c. 2025 and over 80% by 2080), the AEB is responsible for large amounts of the economic output of the country, at least indirectly. Although considered a minor risk due to the construction standards of Gallan concrete sarcophagi, the threat of nuclear core breach by "nefarious elements" or enemy action remained a distant possibility after natural disasters (earthquakes, due to Galla's position on the Ring of Fire, were considered the prime threat to reactors) and accidents such as automobiles on grounds crashing into a containment vessel. Relatively few incidents of such nature had taken place in the world at the time (late 2030's), with the most notable nuclear reactor occurring in in Ta Yue (Great Jade) Empire in the 2010's, with the bulk of radiation flowing out to sea in contaminated coolant water or drifting over broadly uninhabited mountainous terrain.

Regardless, historical accidents with nuclear reactors were the prime concern of the Liquidation Battalions: the Royal Army's Standard Modular Type 1 (SM1) reactor being one of the most important case studies.

Operated in conjunction with the then-nascent Army Atomic Corps and AEB contractors from Gallan Electric AB as a training reactor, the containment very nearly suffered a meltdown during a routine maintenance operation on New Year's Day, 1963. Operators from the AAC were preparing for restart by adjusting positions of the control rods after a fortnight of downtime over Christmas (a procedure at the time done manually, as the SM1 was designed for austere environments). Due to a design oversight, the reactor's control rods required manual withdrawal several inches to be reconnected to the hydraulic, automatic control system. Corporal Joachim Axelsson was in charge of this. Naval Reactor Corps Atomic Boilerman 1st Class (AB1) Adam Svensson was monitoring the situation nearby, while a Sergeant L. Luejtens was watching from the doorway, and Lance Corporal A. Monet maintained watch over CCTV from the control room. It is unclear what caused the incident, as video footage appears to show Corporal Axelsson having some difficulty with the rod. As AB1 Svensson moves to assist, the rod suddenly becomes free and jolts upward nearly two feet. Axelsson and Svensson are seen exchanging surprised glances before the top of the boiler flies off, covering the reactor room in a thick, radioactive fog. The resulting increase in output power, from a sedate 2 MW to well in excess of 20 GW ("excursion"), immediately superheated the coolant water, sending a large slug of semi-liquid water upwards to the top of the reactor vessel. In less than three seconds this slug impacts the top of the boiler, sending it upwards into the air and killing both men instantly. Sgt. Luejtens is last seen slowly backing away from the doorway at the edge of the camera frame before the reactor detonates.

Immediately, temperature alarms go off in the control room, with LCpl Monet phoning a nearby fire station. The temperature alarms, monitored remotely by a Gallan Electric AB station, also result in a response from the contractor's maintenance team, although the operator only receives a busy tone for the next four minutes despite multiple redials. Approximately eight minutes after the initial 112 call, firemen came within sight of the station and were met outside by LCpl Monet. Also at this time, the monitoring station, unable to raise the reactor control room by telephone, dispatched several technicians in a truck to check on the crew. The firemen, wearing equipment similar to modern liquidators (dust masks and painter's suits), initially attempted to enter the main containment hall by turned back as their Geiger counters clicked "out of control", topping nearly 300 rads, although several firemen managed to get a look down the reactor hall, noticing that the large lead door was still partially open and steam was clearly visible emanating from the silo where the reactor was housed. A body, later identified as Sergeant Lars Luejtens, was reported as well, with no sign of either AB1 Svensson or Cpl Axelsson. The firemen returned outside in time to see the GEAB maintenance truck pull up.

Physicist Jens Akersson took immediate command of the situation, questioning Monet as to the whereabouts of the rest of the reactor crew, who responded that they were still inside the containment silo. One of the firemen mentioned they'd seen someone on the ground outside the reactor room. Physicist Akersson, later noting that the firemen "were wholly unprepared" to deal with radiation, picked the most experienced man of the group to accompany him into the structure to look for survivors. The other two maintenance techs, armed with water buckets and mops, ordered the firemen and LCpl Monet to strip down to their skivvies and washed them clean of radioactive dust and contamination, despite the freezing temperatures outside.

Wielding a Geiger counter, Phys. Akersson and fireman de Oises navigated to the reactor hall much more rapidly, Akersson reportedly saying "time is life". de Oises, while noting the injuries of Sergeant Luetjens, determined that he was still alive despite multiple scalding burns after Luetjens "groaned" when he touched him. Akersson took a glance around the reactor room, pointing out the shrapnel shredded body of AB1 Svensson slumped against a wall, and the pair rapidly withdrew. Outside, Akersson ordered that an ambulance be called in from the nearby town, "tell them to bring a lead coffin", while he and de Oises "suited up" with lead aprons, rescue air packs, and a stretcher. Two other fireman, not part of the initial three who entered, Llewellyn Larsson and Lt. Jan Pehrsson, accompanied them. As Akersson, de Oises, Pehrsson, and Larsson re-entered the structure, the firemen, suitably washed down and their clothes "tossed in a trash bin" were quickly redressed in GEAB jumpsuits and split into two teams to map out the radioactive contamination of the site. One team swept the nearby office building where the control room was, while another monitored the roadway and exterior of the building, using Geiger counters, under supervision of the GEAB maintenance technicians.

12 minutes after Akersson and de Oises entered the building, an ambulance. Six minutes later, two additional fire trucks and a small convoy of GEAB and AEB emergency vehicles arrived. A cordon was rapidly established around the reactor and the GEAB contractor team quickly determined that there were no more people needing evacuation, while the AEB on-site emergency coordinator established a field telephone line back to the GEAB monitoring station, which connected him to the regional AEB office. Twenty minutes after entering the reactor, Akersson and de Oises emerged with the still-living Sergeant Luetjens, while Pehrsson and Larsson carried out the shrapnel riddled corpse of AB1 Svensson. AB1 Svensson was placed in the coffin, while Sergeant Luetjens was rushed to the hospital aboard the ambulance. Despite these life-saving measures, Sergeant Luetjens would succumb to his injuries several hours later. For their efforts, Fireman de Oises and Physicist Akersson were awarded the AEB Merit Ribbon, a precursor to the Liquidator Ribbon.

Recovering the body of Cpl Axelsson would require the removal of portions of the silo and reactor fan assembly, which took another eight weeks for the Army Engineering Corps to establish a plan of action, and for the Atomic Force to rail/road transport a prototype, 90-ton, self-moving crane (originally designed for maintenance of nuclear powered jet bombers) equipped with cutting torches and robotic arms, to allow the Engineering Corps to proceed with work in the "hot zone" surrounding the reactor. Despite requiring nearly a month to be removed, Cpl Axelsson's body showed no signs of decomposition at time of recovery. Phys. Jens Akersson, an employee of the AEB, would also oversee the health physics aspects of the three-phased recovery/demolition operation and testify before the Royal Diet with regards to the radioactive contamination of the area.

After the SM1 incident, the AEB established Atomic Emergency Cadres in all Gallan provinces with nuclear reactors, with immediate response capability within 12 hours of a reactor casualty, and emergency coordination between civil emergency responders and military engineering troops. First responder training for response to reactors would also increase, as the AEB successfully lobbied for nuclear energy during the fossil fuel "grid phaseout" of the 1970's and '80's, resulting in modern Liquidation Battalions, which unified the first responder training and the Cadres, alleviating local fire departments of the need to train for something so rare and unlikely to occur. As a result, semi-independent Liqudation Battalions train to evacuate the reactor site first, and establish an armed cordon of AEB Police officers while local emergency responders evacuate civilians downwind of an accidental release of radioactive compounds.

Additionally, firefighters of the Wildlife and Forest Service of the Ministry of the Interior maintain battalions of woodland rescue troops equipped with long-range rocket launchers, converted main battle tanks and APCs, and fire bombers, for use in firestorms. These rescue troops have often been incorporated into reactor emergency exercises by the Liquidation Battalions to provide simulated firefighting capacity due to their use of surplus military equipment and training to fight in oxygen starved environments such as near woodland and suburban (atomic) firestorms.

The liquidator suit depicted is standard issue of the AEB Liquidation Battalions circa 2039. The suit replaces the internal metal hydrides with lead, and is constructed from depleted uranium (as opposed to aluminum-titanium) casts and forgings, being substantially heavier than the Army Fullback suit. Operaitng with an internal oxygen supply due to its use of a fuel cell, the Rescue Suit is piloted by a liquidator wearing the standard painter's smock and full-face dust mask that has been common to AEB inventory for nearly 50 years, as well as commercially available kitchen tabi and gloves for protection of the feet from radioactive liquids and sprays. A connector is also provided through the mask for the liquidator to drink from a backpack worn water bladder. The suit allows the rescuer to traverse deep into a hot zone, performing construction work using specialized equipment (jackhammers or large shovels) or for rescue of injured or incapacitated workers in partially collapsed structures, using a combination of its powerful lifting capability and bright searchlight. The sturdy construction provides protection against both radiation and fall debris, such as pipes or concrete, while the flashing purple lights indicate the tell-tale signs of a radiation emergency in the Gallan emergency services markings.

The liquidator suits, along with their cousins in firefighting services, remain in general civil emergency use even after the Dorestad Incident/Alarian War. Many of these suits remain functional as, since the 2080's both the Royal Army and National Police Bureau have fully divested themselves of the Fullback body armor suit, emptying its inventory to the rest of the government which has rapidly snapped up the suits to cannibalize for spare parts.