THE VIDEO SHELF · nuclear fuel pool safety
What if you swam in a nuclear storage pool?
Randall Munroe of xkcd answers what would happen if you swam in a spent nuclear fuel pool, and how much radiation you would receive at the surface versus at depth.
Why HN readers recommended it
Recommended whenever a thread asks how dangerous it is to fall into a reactor or fuel pool.
This is a summary from the source dataset, not an endorsement by Hacker News or the video creator.
Video & recommendation details
- Creator / channel
- xkcd's What If?
- Topic
- nuclear fuel pool safety
- Format
- explainer
- Level
- general
- HN recommenders in dataset
- 2
- HN mentions in dataset
- 4
- Recommendation years in dataset
- 2024–2025
These counts and years describe the included Hacker News records; they are not YouTube views or the video’s publication date.
From the original HN conversations
Excerpts from the recorded comments. Follow each source for the full comment and surrounding discussion.
Doesn’t it depend on how far they sink? I’m pretty sure xkcd did a comic on this. Oh, it’s a video, here it is: [VIDEO] Edit: ok, I’m probably the fiftieth person to point this out. It’s still a good video.
seanmcdirmid on Hacker News · 2025-10
In A worker fell into a nuclear reactor poolXKCD has a good video about this. The top of the water is remarkably safe, and a life vest would keep you up there! [VIDEO]
benmathes on Hacker News · 2025-10
In A worker fell into a nuclear reactor pool
Summaries, classifications and recommendation records are from the HackerTube source dataset. Read about this library and its limitations.