On January 3, 1961, the SL-1, a small boiling water reactor designed for powering and heating remote radar stations, exploded. All three operators on the site were killed in the accident, leaving investigators to determine what happened. The July issue of Atomic Energy Insights provides the results of the investigations and reveals some information that was never part of the official reports.
Russian Floating Power Stations (June 11, 1996: Source-NucNet, an Internet service of the European Nuclear Agency) – Officials at the Kurchatov Atomic Energy Institute in Moscow have announced that the technical design stage for a series of floating nuclear power stations is now complete. Each power plant will consist of two 70 Mwe pressurized water…
The SL-1 accident was initiated by the rapid withdrawal of the central control rod. Starting from a fully shutdown condition, the action produced a condition in the core technically known as a prompt criticality. When the SL-1 reactor achieved prompt criticality, a number of events happened in rapid succession. The core power level pulsed to…
SL-1’s mission was to provide power to radar stations along the northern perimeter of North America; a series of such stations was known as the DEW (Defense Early Warning) Line. The Army’s designation , SL-1, tells us that the plant was a stationary, low power reactor, and that it was the first of its kind….
Some of the sources that we interviewed suggested that there may have been unstated reasons for not releasing the report. While the term “cover-up” was not used, the phrase “let sleeping dogs lie” was used more than once. One common link in the training of most nukes is the viewing of a grainy, black and…
The root cause of the accident is well understood. Investigators found the central control rod lying across the top of the reactor vessel. All the other rods were clamped in their fully inserted positions. (Note from the editor: The following story is conjecture supported by interviews of first hand sources and a careful review of…
At 9:01 pm on January 3, 1961, the first indication of trouble at SL-1 was received at Atomic Energy Commission Fire Stations. The alarm, which was triggered by one of several measured parameters at the plant, was immediately broadcast over all National Reactor Testing Station radio networks. By 9:10 pm, fire trucks and security personnel…
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