It seems to me that the simplest reactors tend to be the most dangerous. I'm thinking of the Windscale fire and SL-1 in particular. One of the theories for w

It seems to me that the simplest reactors tend to be the most dangerous. I'm thinking of the Windscale fire and SL-1 in particular. One of the theories for what went wrong at SL-1 is that it was a murder-suicide, caused by the man tasked with physically manipulating the control rods of the reactor. I think robotic control is better for something like that. Robots are more predictable. One of the aggravating factors at Windscale was their inability to perform maintenance tasks behind the reactor. They had canisters of radioactive material smashing open behind the reactor and it took them ages to even notice. That was a very simple reactor design; basically a nuclear pile. It was also an awful design that was irradiating England even before it caught fire.