Other formats

    Adobe Portable Document Format file (facsimile images)   TEI XML file   ePub eBook file  

Connect

    mail icontwitter iconBlogspot iconrss icon

Salient. Victoria University Student Newspaper. Volume 39, Number 14, 5 July 1976.

1975 Browns Ferry U.S

1975 Browns Ferry U.S.

At the twin-reactor nuclear power station at Browns Ferry an electrician is using a candle to detect air leaks in the pressurised cable ducts under the control room. The candle touches the "flame-retardant" plastic foam in the wall and sets it alight. The resultant cable fire disables, at a single stroke, five supposedly independent emergency core cooling systems, the remote controls for the several vital valves and diesel generators, and burns out of control for several hours. The incident is called a "Comedy of Errors", and exposes numerous equipment and operator failures. It has since been stated that there was one chance in ten trillion years of reactor operation that such an incident could have occured.