Problems at Davis-Besse worse than expected…
Article from the Cleveland Plain Dealer, (link) on problems at Davis-Besse. Part of the recommended article:
As many as 16 critical parts in the Davis-Besse reactor lid are cracked or flawed, and the problem could get worse.
Engineers expect to find additional problems when they conduct a third round of high-tech inspections in the coming weeks.
The cracks can lead to radioactive coolant seeping into reactor lid, corroding it and ultimately leaking into the heavy-walled building containing the reactor. That’s what happened to Davis-Besse in 2002.
The reactor has been shut down since Feb. 28 for what owner FirstEnergy Corp. initially thought would be a fairly routine refueling and safety inspection. There is no re-start date at this point because of the time-consuming repairs that have barely begun and the planned additional inspections..
Frightening.
April 16th, 2010 at 1:04 pmLisa….Thanks for the important role you play in bring news and information to our community. To the best of my knowledge none of the local news media have reported on this. I hope a lesson is learned and major issues such as this will be investigated and reported.
April 17th, 2010 at 9:22 amThe Blade has been reporting on the Davis-Besse issue since March 1st. We’re happy to see the Plain Dealer join in the coverage.
Councilman, I found The Blade’s coverage of the issue by using the search term, ‘Davis Besse’ (without the quotes) in the search box in the middle of our home page. (link)
Paul Hem, Jr.
April 17th, 2010 at 10:39 amEditorial Systems Manager
The (Toledo) Blade
Mike:
You are right. When I first started in broadcasting in 1979, reporters were doing stories on issues surrounding Davis Besse on a regular basis. The “Watchdog of Society” (news media) has dropped the ball on this one — Lisa excluded.
Maybe the constant repairs of this facility is one of the reasons why our electric rates are up???
Keep up the good work Lisa. You have people who appreciate your efforts.
April 17th, 2010 at 10:57 amApril 15th coverage from the Plain Dealer:
I did check the Blade website before posting this story using the box Mr. Hem describes typing in Davis Besse – the last story that came up on this issue was March 23 – (link) which stated:
Hence, the Cleveland Plain Dealer appeared to have newer information since it referenced more nozzles and was more recent. Which means Councilman Collins is correct that the updated information had not been reported by the local media at the time I posted this, with the same detail. The April 6 article in the Blade did not contain specific numbers.
April 17th, 2010 at 11:46 amIf you want to compare a 130 word Blade article to a 628 word Cleveland Plain Dealer article with a diagram as far as which one provided the most detail on something that does impact our community…
You’ll then see why I pointed out the Cleveland Plain Dealer article, which was a front page story on the Plain Dealer website that day. I try to read all of Ohio’s newspapers as often as possible and to point out coverage/articles I think might be of interest.
April 17th, 2010 at 12:04 pmLisa,
First, if one looks at the link that I furnished in #3, above, then you’ll find quite a few stories and one editorial. So, we had much more than 130 words, including stories from our award-winning journalist, Tom Henry. One of his stories included a diagram and was published a month ago.
Councilman Collins’ remark seemed to imply that the overall issue wasn’t covered locally, not a story with new detail regarding a nuclear station that has been shut down since the end of February.
You must have missed Tom Henry’s March 16th story ‘Davis-Besse could face long outage; tests find cracks on critical parts’ Link = http://www.toledoblade.com/article/20100316/NEWS16/3160338
April 17th, 2010 at 12:52 pmAs with most things, it appears we will have to agree to disagree Paul, there has been no recent local media coverage in detail on the increased number of problems with nozzles. Which is why I thought pointing out the Cleveland Plain Dealer article would be of interest.
As noted, I did check to make sure since this appeared to be something important, that I had not missed coverage of the updated information locally. Collins is correct in his statement that the local media, as a whole, he did not specifically mention your paper, has not covered this in depth and it is important to our area. My intention and motivation was merely to provide information, not to create a comparison, but if a comparison is going to be made, I think the difference in the recent coverage speaks for itself in this scenario. If I were doing a piece on the previous coverage during the past few months, which I did not do, then coverage over 30 days would be more relevant to the discussion.
April 17th, 2010 at 1:04 pmLisa,
We do disagree. It’s an old story. Mr. Collins just missed it, that’s all.
April 17th, 2010 at 1:10 pmIf it were an old story then the numbers would have been reported the same, but? As always thanks for your interest in Glass City Jungle.
April 17th, 2010 at 1:12 pmLisa, I’m not interested in your blog. I am interested in correcting misleading or false information regarding The Blade’s coverage, that’s all.
Councilman Collins is a leader in this community and I just wanted to help him with his understanding of local news coverage. WTOL, also covered the story on March 15th. They didn’t bother to mention the exact number of nozzles. It would be the same story regardless of the number of nozzles involved, unless you are a nuclear engineer. The story regarding public safety was reported over a month ago by both The Blade and WTOL (Who might have had a video story on the air at the time).
April 17th, 2010 at 1:26 pmI’ve not noticed your avid participation elsewhere on the local internets, that said I look forward to the day when I can participate in sharing comments on Blade stories on your Web Site, as opposed to e-mailing reporters with questions and FYI notations.
April 17th, 2010 at 2:34 pmEveryone is welcome to comment on our Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/thetoledoblade
In terms of commenting on our Web site, stay tuned. Since we have such a high volume of traffic on our site, there is more work that our vendor must do before we can offer the quality that our audience expects from us.
April 17th, 2010 at 2:41 pmOf course Dave Murray, our Managing Editor Is @BladeMangingEd on Twitter. Our Executive Managing Editor, Kurt Franck is @KGFranck Yours truly, is @PaulAtTheBlade
Our news participation included @toledonews , @ toledosports and @peachweekender @toledorocks = Features and editorials.
So, have fun. We are.
April 17th, 2010 at 2:56 pmI am having fun, and most of our local media outlets can be found on Twitter and on Facebook. For those of you interested media twitter links, JR over on Toledo Talk recently posted links to those accounts as a part of the discussion on this thread.
Personally I’m not much of a twitter fan though I know others are and I have a twitter page that blog posts and facebook posts from the GCJ, @LisaRenee.
April 17th, 2010 at 3:05 pmThanks, Lisa. Frankly, some of us think JR is right.
April 17th, 2010 at 3:15 pmLOL @ Paul Hem.
He’s not interested but he seems to comment here every now and then, and usually looks like a doofy cause of how he tries to “take on” Lisa.
Of course you can comment on FB, the Blade hasn’t figured how to turn that off yet.
Also, they might have to hire some people to delete the “offending” posts if comments are ever turned on, and while their competitor that has a higher sunday circulation is able to hire, such is not true with the Blade.
I personally don’t believe comments will ever be turned on on the Blade’s site. Also, I saw Dave Murray (in person) explain why one can’t comment on the Blade’s website and he gave a different reason – he said he was running into roadblocks higgher up. If it was the volume of traffic, he would have said so, no?
I honestly don’t believe a word that comes out of Blade employee’s mouths.
That’ll be the day when the Editorial pages will be allowed to be commented on just like the Editor of the Free Press allows comments on his opinions.
April 17th, 2010 at 4:04 pmMr. Morrisey,
No one pays for your paper. So, your circulation numbers are meaningless in comparison to The Blade’s where people agree to subscribe for a fee.
April 17th, 2010 at 4:28 pmAs for the rest of your drivel… Believe whatever you want.
April 17th, 2010 at 4:37 pmLest this topic become nuclear in a manner not related to the actual topic at hand, which was Davis Besse, most news consumers focus on circulation numbers as a whole as opposed to those more expert in the nuances of the various auditing companies and the requirements paid versus non-paid circulations.
The original post was about the Cleveland Plain Dealer article, D. Michael Collins comment about the lack of coverage on this issue by all local media was a valid point. I’m sure his compliment to me was not intended to turn this discussion into a TFP versus Blade commentary.
April 17th, 2010 at 5:48 pmPoint of order, here… Mr. Collins said, “To the best of my knowledge none of the local news media have reported on this.”
I have only pointed out that the issue was, in fact, covered by The Blade and WTOL, Channel 11.
If Mr. Collins meant that he was describing a difference in about 12 or 13 nozzles as opposed to a few more, then he can say so.
April 17th, 2010 at 5:55 pmPoint of order acknowledged and more than covered, there’s no point in rehashing the previous points made in response to the timeline factor.
April 17th, 2010 at 6:44 pmIn my opinion, The Blade has gone to the dogs and maybe that’s why they’ve missed the major coverage on this serious issue. We’ve already canceled our subscription and are currently shopping a new provider for phone/internet/cable, so that we aren’t contributing to their bias and bashing.
April 17th, 2010 at 7:20 pmMr Hem, as evidenced by massive losses at the Blade, not many are paying for your paper, but that’s not your business model.
LOL
April 17th, 2010 at 9:25 pmAnd it’s 2 S’s (MorriSSey)
April 17th, 2010 at 9:29 pmMr. MoriSSey, where is your evidence of “massive losses.” Since you wrote, “as evidenced by massive losses…” I would expect a reporter for the weekly TFP, such as yourself, to have a credible source for that claim.
Also, forgive my misspelling of your name, perhaps you have the same problem, since you spell it “Mo.”
April 17th, 2010 at 9:51 pmTom is an opinion writer, so the title of reporter would not be accurate.
That written, I have asked everyone to focus on the topic which is not the Blade, not the TFP, not Tom’s last name, it is Davis Besse.
Pointing out concerns with the lack of media coverage was at least related to the topic at hand.
As to the original topic, here is an interesting 17 page pdf from the United Concerned Scientists organization that was referenced in some of the early April media coverage.
April 17th, 2010 at 10:05 pmI’m curious how much money this is costing first energy. It seems like there is nothing but problems out there, but apparently it must be worth it. Proponents of nuclear energy talk about it’s efficiency and low cost, does Davis besse still fall on this category when it’s getting shut down indefinitely?
April 18th, 2010 at 7:02 amThat’s a good question, in 2002 when FirstEnergy had to shut Davis Besse down for two years it was said to cost more than $600 million in repairs and lost energy costs. It does raise the question once again if the repairs are worth it at the end of the day.
April 18th, 2010 at 11:37 amThanks for posting this. With everything going on these last months here – I wouldn’t have picked this up at all. Kind of spooks me a little, but I’ve watched alot of bad horror movies too! But it makes you think about how close this facility actually is. I hope that they get better at inspecting this facility, its proving that it might be more potential trouble than its worth for the value it provides.
On a more positive note, I can tell you that we appreciate our City Councilman, Mr. Collins. He just does a good job for us and I’m impressed that he takes phone calls and even takes the time to talk to us directly, as he does here on this blog. We need more politicians of this caliber.
April 18th, 2010 at 9:42 pm