Fire puts Alabama nuke plant on alert status

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Fire puts nuke plant on alert status The Associated Press 8/16/00 11:44 PM

DOTHAN, Ala. (AP) -- A water pump fire that caused the Farley Nuclear Power Plant to go on alert status for more than an hour was put out by on-site crews, officials said.

No one was injured in Wednesday's blaze, and the plant's reactors were not at risk.

The fire broke out at about 4:25 p.m. The pump is one of five that feeds cooling water to the plant's two reactors, but the plant only uses four of the pumps at a time, said Rick Kimball, a spokesman for the Southern Nuclear Operating Co., which runs the plant.

The pump was about one-half mile from the main part of the plant.

By 5:40 p.m., the plant was taken off alert status. An alert is the second of four increasingly severe categories of emergencies.

The plant was operating at full capacity Wednesday night, Kimball said.

Kimball said the cause of the fire was still under investigation.

"There was no threat to the public and this event was strictly an on-site situation at the Farley Plant," said Lee Helms, executive operations officer for the Alabama Emergency Management Agency.

http://www.al.com/newsflash/index.ssf?/cgi-free/getstory_ssf.cgi?j1627_BC_AL-BRF--NuclearPlant-&&news&al_headlines

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), August 17, 2000


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