A crack was found in the casing of the axle junction of the ceiling crane in the Spent Fuel Pool at Fukushima I Nuke Plant. I don't remember ever hearing about this facility, other than "everything is normal".
The crack, which wasn't found out until October 27, is about 5-millimeter wide, and goes all around the circumference of the casing.
From TEPCO's handout for the press (10/28/2011):
The Spent Fuel Pool currently contains 6,375 spent fuel rods, according to Asahi Shinbun (10/29/2011). The newspaper also says the crack is considered to have formed after the March 11 earthquake.
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12 comments:
Why are they looking at this now? Planning to move the fuel??
So they say, but they don't say when. Heavy crane tumbling into the SFP is not what they need.
Maybe I misunderstand, but is there an additional building for spent fuel or do they talk about one of the spent fuel pools at reactor 2, 5 or 6?
There is an additional building for spent fuel, in addition to the SFPs in each Reactor.
arevamirpal::laprimavera thanks for the clarification I had same ?
The common spent pool was in the TEPCO news on Sept.,20 and 21, when they found "a puddle of water" during power panel works:
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from Press Release (Sep 20,2011)
Status of TEPCO's Facilities and its services after the Tohoku-Chihou-Taiheiyou-Oki Earthquake (as of 9:00 am, September 20)
*At 11:08 am on September 14, the Common Pool's cooling system was shutdown to move a Common Pool Power Center so that we will replace a power panel installed at the basement of Spent Fuel Common Pool. At 5:22 pm on September 19, the transfer of the Common Pool Power Center was completed, Common Pool's cooling was restarted.
from Press Release (Sep 20,2011)
Status of TEPCO's Facilities and its services after the Tohoku-Chihou-Taiheiyou-Oki Earthquake (as of 3:00 pm, September 20)
* At approximately 11:00 am on September 20, a puddle of water was found at the basement of common spent fuel pool. We are planning to conduct sampling of the puddle of water.
from Press Release (Sep 21,2011)
Status of TEPCO's Facilities and its services after the Tohoku-Chihou-Taiheiyou-Oki Earthquake (as of 9:00 am, September 21
*At approximately 11:00 am on September 20, a puddle of water was found at the basement of common spent fuel pool. As a result of nuclide analysis of the water, some radioactive materials (Cs 134: 4.7-7.0x100 [Bq/cm3], Cs 137: 5.4-8.1x100 [Bq/cm3], Co 60: 1.2x100 [Bq/cm3]) were detected. However we assume that there is no leakage outside because any pipeline connecting to the outside does not exist. We are now investigating sources of the influent water.
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That looks to be a very poorly designed crane axle. There appears to be a lot of metal (weight) used to span that amount of distance across the pond. That span should have been safety chained years ago with an axle setup like this. I'm guessing that small earthquakes or tremors could have produced a crack like this years before now.
My first post. Outsider
That crack will render the crane non-functional but will not result in a collapse.
"That looks to be a very poorly designed ... October 30, 2011 9:05 AM "
All TEPCO Theater designs done, approved, in the 50's, by G.E. 'Colorado'. Slide Rule computing pwr.
Tested design ... like most ticking 500 plutonium beachbombs. Specified to irradiate its surroundings, atmosphere, while pumping 3/4 of produced heat into the sea as waste...
This theater is used only in entertainment of the irradiated.
"500 plutonium beachbombs". so all nuclear reactors around the world are using plutonium? that's news to me.
@anon 8:47AM, actually, if the uranium fuel is used for some time, plutonium is naturally created. So yes, probably all nuclear reactors around the world has plutonium in the fuel.
Looks like earthquake-induced breaking of a worn weld joint weakened by mechanical stress and corrosion.
This will make impossible to move out the spent fuel to other storage locations.
But this is urgent because this giant pool contains several dozens of burnt-up reactor cores.
If cooling of any of the four reactor fuel pools fails for any reason the intense radiation of the fuel fire smoke plume will make the whole plant area inaccessible.
Even if, for instance, only a "minor" pool like at reactor 1 with roughly 200 fuel rods loses cooling and burns off.
This will trigger a chain reaction. All other pools will eventually fall dry and ignite.
In other words, Nuclear boy has only farted badly up to now.
The danger of him spraying nuclear sh.t all over Japan is still imminent.
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