South America
 INES 3 |
Accident in industrial radiography |
A radiographer was taking several radiographic films to a pipes by the night. In order to be sure that the guide tube was correctly the radiographer went to the tube guide an collimator to fix them. This operation was made by 40 times. Eventually the radiographer touched with his left hand, at least 10 times, the tube guide where the source was unnoticed. Also, two auxiliar staff went to the radiographer position carrying the films to be checked at least by 40 and 20 times. The radioactive source was 3199,5 GBq Ir-192. The event was detected at the end of job.
INES 3 |
Potential Overexposure During Co-60 Source Exchange |
On July 21, 2008, two radiation workers, A and B, one American and one Brazilian, respectively, had received a potential overexposure. While in a hospital in the State of São Paulo, Brazil, they were in the process of exchanging an expended cobalt-60 source with a new cobalt-60 source. After engaging the source holder with the removal tool, worker A transferred the source holder from the unit head into the transfer cask. Once the source holder was in the transfer cask, worker A continued making preparations to complete the removal sequence.
INES 0 |
TURBINE TRIP AND MANUAL SCRAM DURING NORMALIZATION OF A HEAT EXCHANGER OF THE MAIN OUTPUT TRANSFORMER |
On December 15th, 2007, while putting in service a heat exchanger of the main output transformer, after its reparation, the actuation of the protection of the block occurred, producing a turbine trip and electric commutation on the start up line. After that a manual SCRAM was needed according to the operating instruction, not being able to normalize the Electric System in the required time.
INES 0 |
Steam Generator tube leakage at Atucha N.P.P |
On March 16, 2007, Atucha NPP, was shutdown due to a steam generator tube failure (SG # 2). The plant remained in cold shutdown, for 9 days, starting up on March 25, 2007.The Total Activity released was less than 20 % of the monthly allowed derived limit for discharge. The mentioned event was not considered safety significant, however, it was assumed reportable because of “degradation of in-depth defense”.
INES 1 |
Incidental Exposure during maintenance tasks |
On December 7th, 2006 the radiation safety officer of a licensed facility notified the Nuclear Regulatory Authority about the incidental exposure of twenty-six workers that were carrying out maintenance tasks and inspection inside coke cameras, commonly used in the process of petroleum refineries .
These workers were exposed to neutron radiation of nuclear gauges containing approximately 37 GBq of Am-241 (Be), located in those cameras.
INES 0 |
Steam Generator tube leakage at Embalse NPP |
On February 16, Embalse NPP was shutdown due to a Steam Generator tube failure (SG#4). The plant remain out of servicie to repair the failure. The mentioned event is not considered Safety Significant, however, in view of the increasing number of S.G tubes failures detected during the last year, an investigation of the causes is in course
INES 0 |
Shutdown due to Tritium increase in reactor room |
On December 17th, Atucha I was manually shutdown to perform corrective maintenance tasks.
The cause of the was the unexpected increase in [H3] into the reactor room produced by a loss of heavy water after a process of refueling in fuel channel K15.
The estimated time to restart operation is a week, however it will depend of the evaluation in course
INES [N/A] |
Manual Shutdown at Embalse N.P.P |
On December 15th 2006, Embalse N.P.P went to "safe shutdown condition" following the corresponding procedures. It has done to repair a Primary Heat Transport System Main Pump seal (3312-P4).Embalse startup today at 7:30 AM
INES 2 |
Worker overexposure during maintenance |
This updated information includes data related to the actual dose received by the agent involved in the event occurred in September 1st 2005 at Atucha 1 N.P.P
Such event took place while calibration actions were taking place in the recently replaced fuelling machine.
Evaluations and measurements of the received dose due to tritium incorporation determined that only one agent exceeded dose limits.
According to the final assessment, an effective dose by internal incorporation received by the agent was 41,85 mSv.
INES 2 |
RADIOACTIVE ORPHANED SOURCES OF CS-137 |
On September 27 2004 a radioactive source was detected when transported in a vehicle to an important steel mill. A warning was received from the monitoring equipment installed to survey entering scrap iron at the entrance of the Scrap Service Company. Immediately the System of Intervention in Radiological Emergencies of the Nuclear Regulatory Authority (ARN) was called, detecting an orphaned radioactive source of Cs-137.
The material found was an unlabelled and unidentified piece of metal.
The Intervention Group took immediately actions putting the source under control and defence.
