False alarm forces Kaiga reactor shutdown

A false alarm in unit-3 of the Kaiga Generating Station in Uttar Kannada District of Karnataka forced nuclear engineers to shut down the reactor on Friday.

“It was a spurious alarm. As a precautionary measure, we decided to shut down the reactor. We did this as part of our safety culture. There is no problem at all,” said J.P. Gupta, Site Director, Kaiga units 1, 2, 3 and 4.

‘Nothing abnormal'

The fire detection alarm system in the control room sprang into action but inspection of the area concerned revealed nothing abnormal, he said.

Surveillance tests

Unit-3 was due for a shutdown in May for surveillance tests, in-service inspection and checking whether the leak rate in the reactor building was within permissible limits. These would be done now and the unit started up on April 17, Mr. Gupta said.

The Kaiga station has four nuclear power reactors, each with a capacity of 220 MWe.