Sellafield sites blogs
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What a packed day...
Posted by: Karl Connor on 12 February 2008
As I sit here writing this the local time is 1.08 and I feel like I've not stopped since I opened my eyes at six on what is now yesterday morning.
There is so much to say, my biggest worry is that if I write all the interesting things it'll be time to have breakfast and I still won't be in bed.
Having travelled half-way across Europe with comparatively little knowledge of the industry and hardly experience of working in nuclear communications I did feel a bit of a fraud as I entered a room packed with some of the worlds best communicators. My nervousness was added to when the first speaker, Prof Giovanni Carrada, talked about the dangers of so called "mini-experts" who have very little scientific knowledge and who try to communicate to the public what they don't really know themselves.
Thankfully as the morning continued my nervousness disappeared and thankfully the conference was more about communications
than it was nuclear power. As a former journalist communications is something I have a reasonable knowledge of, and the further down that line the presentations went the more at home I felt.
The highlight of the day was a speech by former US TV reporter David Ropeik, who now does consultancy work on crisis communications. He explained how the brain works to make people fear nuclear before they have had chance to listen to reason. This is something we constantly face in the press office, minds made up based on old stereotypes and pre-(mis)conceptions. This was truly fascinating stuff for someone in my position, and in a workshop later in the conference David will show us ways of training the brain, to beat the fear factor.
The afternoon was dedicated to new technology and I am delighted to say that, once again, Sellafield Ltd is a leading light.
The main tip was, wait for it, create blogs and don't be afraid to use them.
As the only delegate currently using the "blogosphere" to report back day by day I did feel rather like the head boy during the workshop, but it is good to know that we are doing the right things in the Comms department.
A rather glitzy gala dinner followed where I enjoyed some lovely roast duck, cooked to perfection -- the only trouble was that the portion would have left a hamster feeling peckish. Never mind, I also got a slice of reactor shaped cake that was handed out to mark PIME's 20th birthday.
Entertainment was provided by a rather mad yet entertaining 80s "electro-boogie" act called The Robots, and then the Czech answer to Girls Aloud, a singer who’s name now escapes me but seemed to drive the locals crazy.
I left the party in full swing having made good friends with Dmitry Bobkov, from Russia, Holland's Dr Verhoef and a number of UK based nuclear professionals, including one time Thorp boss and now European Nuclear Society president, David Bosner, who sends his regards.
