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Published: 8 november
2012 07:40
Explosion at Electrabel Nijmegen
NIJMEGEN – At the energy supplier
Electrabel in Nijmegen on Thursday an explosion occurred, the police reported.
Shortly after seven a.m. residents heard a
bang from the plant at the Weurtseweg, followed by a continuous loud noise. The
police reports that there is no one wounded. There are no missing persons. The
explosion occurred in a boiler, said a spokesman from Electrabel. Thus a hole
was created, from which steam escaped. During this process, pure water was
released.
Cooling
It will take a long time before the
resulting steam is evaporated and the boiler has cooled. After the explosion,
the seven present employees went to the control room to turn off the plant,
according to the protocol. This was reported by the police.
In a steam power plant normally a turbine
is driven by hot steam, which in turn rotates a generator. Possibly too much
steam was built up in the boiler. The emission of steam is slowly but surely
decreasing, and along with it, so will the noise.
There is no danger of collapse, although a
facade has been badly damaged. Due to the explosion much insulation material
has fallen onto the surrounding streets. Other plants have taken over the
electricity production.
The fire department is still investigating
whether asbestos was released. The safety region indicates that glass wool
particles could have been released into the environment. The advice is not to
touch these and leave them where they are.
Locked
The district where the plant is located,
still remains a closed off area. It will take a long time before the plant
becomes operational again, said a police spokeswoman.
The police have been flooded with calls
from all around, especially from the Betuwe area.
The navigation on the river Waal was not
halted. However, the lock on the Maas-Waal canal was closed for some time.
Businesses in the area were evacuated for
some time and for residents the advice was to keep windows and doors shut. This
advice was withdrawn by the municipality shortly after nine o'clock. '' There
is still a lot of glass in the area,'' said a spokeswoman.
Broadcasting Agency Gelderland
After being unreachable for a half hour,
the site of Broadcasting Agency Gelderland is functioning again on Thursday
morning. A spokesman for the regional broadcasting explains the crashing of the
site was due to the large number of people that wanted to see images of the
explosion at Electrabel.
''The first hour after the explosion the
site was easily accessible. It went wrong when the national news reported that
Broadcasting Agency Gelderland had live images. Then the whole of the
Netherlands wanted to see that.'' The site of Broadcasting Agency Gelderland
can hold up to 10,000 visitors simultaneously.
It has long been a given
that regional broadcasters, who also function as an emergency transmitter, do
not have enough internet capacity during a disaster.
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