Word: nrc
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...that some of the fuel rods had been damaged on Wednesday, when the emergency cooling system had been briefly shut off, apparently because of an equipment failure that was quickly corrected. Company officials said less than 1% of the 37,000 rods had been damaged; by week's end NRC investigators increased the estimate...
...Friday all of the sanguine assurances were blown away by additional releases of radioactivity into the skies above the plant. According to NRC spokesmen, early morning workers had been trying to remove some radioactive water from the pump building. As the water flowed into a storage tank, the temperature and pressure rose. A valve automatically opened, letting some of the gas escape. The building's ventilation system sucked up the gas and blew it out a stack. At that moment, a state and federal monitoring crew flying over the stack recorded an alarming increase in radiation...
...possible full-scale flight from the region? The first explanation came from NRC officials. They said the reactor had unexpectedly developed an 880-cu.-ft. gas bubble, which was compressed between the water covering the reactor's core and the top of its steel housing. Acting like a lid on a pressure cooker, the bubble was maintaining high temperatures and pressures. NRC officials warned that there was a very remote but frightening possibility that the bubble would grow big enough to block the flow of water. In that case, the temperature in the core could rise high enough (3,000?...
...bubble problem had not been anticipated in engineering studies. Said Dudley Thompson, an executive officer of the NRC: "We are in a situation that is not a situation we have ever been in before." As officials studied the complex hazard, they discovered yet another ominous possibility: if the amount of hydrogen in the reactor kept growing, it could reach a level at which only a spark would be needed to set off a hydrogen-gas explosion. If the explosion were powerful enough, the core vessel might rupture and the concrete walls of the container building might break, exposing the surrounding...
Because preparations would take several days, the engineers said they would not make an attempt to remove the bubble until this week. When they do, said NRC Chairman Joseph M. Hendrie, all people within ten or 20 miles downwind of the plant may be evacuated "if we determine that the process of getting rid of the gas bubble has unsafe elements...