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A look at past radiation scares after South Carolina lab fire
South Carolina nuclear lab fire sparks emergency response: A look at major radiation scares around the world.
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A fire at the Savannah River National Laboratory on the US Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina triggered a site-wide emergency response on Wednesday. Later, the authorities confirmed that the localised blaze was contained and that no off-site radiation was released. Among other things, the lab currently experiments with nuclear materials.
A news release stated, “A fire was reported at the Savannah River National Laboratory but has since been extinguished. No contamination has been reported outside the affected facility.”
Also Read: Emergency response triggered at South Carolina nuclear site after fire erupts at lab
While the immediate threat was successfully neutralised, the emergency response has once again drawn attention to the risks associated with nuclear infrastructure. The scare joins a long timeline of global nuclear events.
Three Mile Island power plant - USA
A combination of equipment failures and operator errors caused a loss of coolant, leading to a partial meltdown of the Unit 2 reactor core on March 28, 1979. It remains one of the most serious commercial nuclear power plant accidents in US history.
Despite the severe core damage, the reactor's containment structure held, preventing large releases of radiation into the environment. Subsequent comprehensive scientific studies confirmed that off-site radiation exposure was extremely low.
Davis–Besse Nuclear Power Station - USA
On March 5, 2002, maintenance workers discovered a “football-sized” hole in the reactor vessel head. They discovered that severe boric acid corrosion had eaten a hole through six inches of the carbon steel reactor head but did not cause a reactor accident.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) fined FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Company - the plant's operating company at the time - more than $5 million for the violations that led to the corrosion.
Saint-Laurent Nuclear Power Plant - France
France’s nuclear events involved fuel elements melting inside gas-cooled reactors, first during a graphite-loading error in 1969 and again in 1980.
Both incidents were safely contained on-site, resulting in zero off-site environmental damage or casualties.
Hanford Site - USA
Established during World War II to produce plutonium, this decommissioned site is located in south-central Washington. On May 9, 2017, a portion of the storage tunnel, where radioactive waste was being stored, collapsed. The incident forced an emergency declaration at the site.
"There are no reports of injuries, no reports of radiological release," at the time Destry Henderson, deputy news manager for the Hanford Joint Information Center, told NBC News. "I would underscore this is confined to a small area of the Hanford site."
Dounreay - UK
A localised fire broke out inside a decommissioned fast reactor facility during sodium disposal operations on October 7, 2014.
Emergency crews safely extinguished the blaze, and environmental monitoring confirmed that the containment barriers held. However, according to a 2014 BBC report, the fire led to "unauthorised release" of radioactivity into the environment.
Reprocessing Plant at Tomsk - Russia
A major radiological accident occurred at a plutonium extraction facility at a location then known as Tomsk-7, Russian Federation, on April 6, 1993. An explosive buildup of pressure inside a reaction vessel containing nitric acid, uranium, and plutonium destroyed the room and damaged the roof.
The incident led to contamination of the site and the surrounding area up to 28 km away.
Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station - Japan
On March 11, 2011, Japan was devastated by a tsunami caused by a massive earthquake of magnitude 9.0 on the Richter scale. It also led to one of the most severe nuclear power site accidents in history at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.
Three of the station’s six reactors suffered core meltdowns, and the incident was categorised as a Level 7. The plant’s backup generators were disabled due to the tsunami, resulting in cooling failures and hydrogen explosions. No one died as a direct result of the Fukushima nuclear disaster.
Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant - USA
In March, roughly 200 gallons of oil leaked from the Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant in southern Minnesota.
"It is our priority to be good stewards of the environment and the communities where our facilities are based," Minneapolis-based Xcel Energy officials said in a then-released statement. According to Xcel, the plant was "shut down for maintenance", and no oil reached the Mississippi River.
Three years earlier, 400,000 gallons of water containing the radioactive isotope tritium leaked from the facility into the groundwater.
(Information taken from Nuclear Regulatory Commission reports)
