Massive Outage Forces US to Close 7 Nuke Power Plants

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Friday, August 15, 2003

Massive Outage Forces US to Close 7 Nuke Power Plants

The US authorities closed seven nuclear power plants Thursday after massive power outage hit northeastern United States, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) announced.

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The US authorities closed seven nuclear power plants Thursday after massive power outage hit northeastern United States, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) announced.

In a statement, the NRC said that the closures were ordered because of "grid instabilities."

It added that "all plants are in a safe condition, using their emergency diesel generators where appropriate."

The seven closed plants are Indian Point, Ginna, Fitzpatrick and Nine Mile Point in New York state, Perry in Ohio, Fermi in Michigan and Oyster Creek in New Jersey.

Earlier on Thursday, the US Department of Homeland Security and the FBI ruled out the possibility of terrorism behind the massive power blackout.

"Initial reports indicate that this is a power system failure not related to terrorism," said Brian Roehrkasse, spokesman for the Department.

Meanwhile, the FBI had also determined that the outage was a "natural occurrence" with no evidence of an act of terrorism.

A massive power blackout struck several major US and Canadian cities on Thursday, including New York, Detroit, Cleveland, Toronto and Ottawa, forcing thousands of people to run into the streets.

New York Gov. George Pataki declared a state of emergency soon after the outage and said officials thought the cause of the blackout was "a possible transmission problem from Canada to the US."

There was no sign of terrorism, officials in New York and Washington said.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said it was likely the blackout started in the Niagara Falls area and quickly spread.

"It was probably a natural occurrence which disrupted the power system up there and it apparently for reasons we don't know cascaded down through New York state over into Connecticut, as far south as New Jersey and as far west as Ohio," Bloomberg said.

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