Tuesday, May 12, 2015

Update on Yesterday's Post

Thank you to my readers who expressed concern about a transformer fire at a nuclear power plant about 16 miles from where I was visiting in laws on Saturday night, and their safety.

The power plant, Indian Point, provides power to millions of people in New York City and Westchester County, a county just to the north of New York City.

I want to assure everyone that the power plant did not explode.  A transformer (a device that takes electricity manufactured by the plant and converts it to a level usable by the public)  failed and caught on fire.  The fire was extinguished but reunited, was extinguished again, and chemicals from the fire were released into the Hudson River. Now, there are pollution concerns.

There was no release of radiation, according to authorities, but, again, there are concerns about the release of this fluid into the Hudson River.  Also, according to authorities, there have been other incidents.

Quoting from the New York Times: 
"Mr. Cuomo [NY's governor] said there had been too many emergencies recently involving Indian Point. Unit 3 was shut down Thursday morning for an unrelated issue — a water leak on the nonnuclear side of the plant.
“We have to get to the bottom of this,” the governor said."

In the meantime, the plant remains offline.

If there had been an incident Saturday night, we would have been there to help evacuate my mother in law and developmentally disabled brother in law.  But we wouldn't even have known the evacuation route to use.  Would there have been buses available?  My mother in law no longer drives at night.

Just another aspect of long distance caregiving.

5 comments:

  1. Pity. General Electric just finished remediation of years and years of pollution from the river, and now the DEP has to deal with a new mess.

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  2. Yikes! Life is full of risks, isn't it, Alana? Things that you don't prepare for crop up all the time. Good thing you were there for your family, just in case.

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  3. Thanks for the update! Glad to hear there is no immediate concern for their safety. I guess it would be good to know ahead of time about such things as evacuation routes and transportation, just in case.

    That is disturbing about the pollution into the Hudson - hope the authorities will be able to successfully deal with that so it doesn't become a health concern for wildlife or human populations.

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  4. Perhaps this is a wake-up call. Time to find a good neighbor to be your go-between in case something happens. Is there someone near to both of them that could be of help in an emergency situation? Someone you could call when you hear of trouble?

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  5. Nuclear power is such a mixed blessing. Or perhaps not a blessing at all when you think of the potential ramifications. We don't have nuclear power plants in my city, but I very much doubt most people would have the first clue about evacuation routes in the event of other natural disasters--earthquake, tsunami, alien invasion...

    And, really, how many cities have even vaguely practical plans re: evacuating the elderly and the vulnerable? It's a terrifying prospect.

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