Retired nuclear scientist and Basingstoke resident of many years, Suzanne Fletcher-Mallinson, Fellow of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, gave an outline to the Probus Club of Basingstoke of her working life spent in various sections of the nuclear industry.
After earning her MSc from the University of California, Berkeley, she joined Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California, an institution known for designing nuclear systems comparable to those developed at Los Alamos National Laboratory. She facilitated nuclear and delivery system testing in Nevada and certified LLNL systems at more than seven production sites.
By 1990 the USA had produced approximately 70,000 nuclear devices across 65 types. Suzanne described field tests of a 6-inch diameter device using Nato guns. Next was her involvement in President Reagan’s ‘Star Wars’ – Strategic Defence Initiative project to create a dome of defence using nuclear-driven x-ray lasers to knock out incoming nuclear missiles.
Moving to AWE in Aldermaston she married in January 1989 which qualified her for British citizenship five years later.
Following various roles, including being physicist and manager of the remaining reactor on the Aldermaston site, VIPER, she became the Technical Assistant to the Director of Research & Applied Science.
Throughout her career she also performed research alongside her engineering roles. This led to her attending conferences at Nashville Tennessee, Lucerne in Switzerland, Kyoto in Japan, and London.
Following a career break after the birth of her third child in 2003, she joined Serco from 2007 – 2012 as a Nuclear Safety Consultant. Based at Harwell in Oxfordshire she also covered AWE Aldermaston and Burghfield (A and B) as well as Winfrith in Dorset.
Suzanne rejoined AWE as an Internal Regulator in 2012, ensuring the safety standard and compliance of many of the facilities on the AWE A and B sites.
The Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) snapped her up as a Nuclear Safety Regulator in 2016. Here her remit included various facilities at Sellafield in Cumbria and two defence sites associated with nuclear submarine building and maintenance at Barrow-in-Furness and Devonport.
Partway through her time with ONR she shifted from Safety Regulation to Security Regulation. The ONR work included many nuclear sites as well as assessment of two Small Modular Reactors (SMR) going through the Generic Design Assessment stage of Licencing. She retired in October 2024.
Today her interests include being a square dance caller across southern England, being Secretary of the Square Dance Callers Club of Great Britian and being a member of the Ladies’ Probus Club of Basingstoke. For more information about the Ladies’ Probus Club of Basingstoke email their secretary at reverendjane@hotmail.co.uk or phone her on 01256 471193.
For more information about the Men’s Probus Club of Basingstoke see http://www.probusbasingstoke.club or phone their secretary on 07814 937202 for an informal chat.
Probus Club of Basingstoke 