Hurricane Irene knocked a nuclear reactor offline at Calvert Cliffs

[nadinbrzezinski]

Hurricane Irene sent a nuclear reactor offline late Saturday night. That's according to the Constellation Energy Nuclear Group.

Costellation says a heavy gust of wind knocked a large piece of aluminum siding from the building. The siding came in contact with a main transformer


Read more: http://www.abc2news.com/dpp/news/region/eastern_shore/hurricane-irene-knocked-a-nuclear-reactor-offline-at-calvert-cliffs#ixzz1WJ3SMTBg

More complete story

Nuclear Plant Under 'Unusual Event'

Aluminum Siding Hits Calvert Cliffs

LUSBY, Md. -- Calvert Cliffs, a Southern Maryland nuclear power plant, automatically went offline overnight.

Constellation Energy Nuclear Group spokesman Mark Sullivan released a statement shortly before 2 a.m. saying the Calvert Cliffs facility is safe and stable. He said an "Unusual Event" has been declared, which is the lowest of four emergency classifications by the National Regulatory Commission.
The facility’s Unit 2 is stable and operating at 100 percent power.
Sullivan said heavy wind gusts associated with Hurricane Irene blew a large piece of aluminum siding from a building, which then struck the facility's man transformer.

Read more: http://www.wbaltv.com/news/29003502/detail.html#ixzz1WJ6VUGUg

[bananas]

1. They're supposed to be turned off before storms reach them - the lessons of Fukushima and the 2003 b

The lessons of Fukushima and the 2003 blackout haven't been learned.
Two articles about the 2003 blackout: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=3958656&mesg_id=3958658

[FBaggins]

2. The lesson of Fukushima and the 2003 blackout is that they should be off for storms?

That's odd. I don't remember storms being a big issue in either case. Refering to the 2003 blackout doesn't seem to make much sense. A number of reactors lost external power, but not due to storm or anything that could be planned for... and all of them switched properly over to backup power without incident... so I'm not sure what "lesson" applies to today.

One plant was shut down in advance of weather that was expected to exceed their guidelines. None of the rest were "supposed to be turned off".