—shuttle and upper stage launch anomalies; —conditional probabilities that an accident will affect the RTG; —distribution of atmospheric dispersive power (e.g. atmospheric stability, wind direction, etc.); —health effects on humans and the environment. As is done in the safety analysis, the EIS is characterized by the bottom-line consequences of those complexes distributions for each mission phase as follows: Most Probable Case. The accident leading to a release with the highest probability, coupled with the median meterology. Maximum Credible Case. The accident leading to a release which, coupled with appropriate meteorology, maximizes the effect on human health. The lower limiting probability was set at 1 X E-7 (i.e. credibility limit). Expectation Case. The probability-weighted consequence of all accidents in a mission phase. These results taken from the Galileo EIS [8] are shown in Tables I-IV. Now how does one characterize these results? Consider the maximum credible case analysis. In terms of possible health impacts, the possible consequences are very small. In the remote event of a VEEGA reentry, there could be 9.4 excess cancer mortalities over a 70-year period in an affected population of some 71 300. In that population, over a 70-year period, one would expect about 14000 fatalities. So there is no appreciable increase in risk.
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