Clean-up on radioactive floor

May 20, 2013

Tepco had subcontract workers manually wipe out the leaking oil by rag beside reactor3

http://fukushima-diary.com/2013/05/tepco-had-subcontract-workers-manually-wipe-out-the-leaking-oil-by-rag-beside-reactor3/

On 5/18/2013, Fukushima Diary reported “Remote-control heavy equipment leaked flammable oil on debris removal of reactor3, Tepco “Far enough from SFP” [URL]”

According to Tepco, they had subcontract workers (Not Tepco workers) wipe out the leaking oil on the assembly base directly.

Due to the high level of radiation, human workers can’t get on the operation floor of reactor3. This is why they are removing the debris by using the remote-control heavy equipment.

Former Fukushima worker, Happy11311 commented on Twitter like this.

(cf, Debris removal of reactor3 sacrifices human worker to watch being significantly exposed [URL])

As I tweeted below, the debris removal of the operation floor of reactor3 is really difficult. Because the operation floor of reactor3 is extremely radioactive, human workers can’t work unlike on reactor4. Removing task is operated by remote controlling, but camera can’t cover the sight adequately sometimes.

The assembly base, where the heavy equipment leaked oil is located beside the extremely radioactive reactor3.

The subcontract workers wiped it out by oil adsorption mat and rag. The exposure dose is not reported. 

http://www.tepco.co.jp/nu/fukushima-np/handouts/2013/images/handouts_130520_08-j.pdf 

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on May 18, TEPCO wrote :

 Press Releases 2013

Press Release (May 18,2013)Oil Leakage from Unmanned Heavy Equipment Used for Debris Removal in Unit 3 Reactor Building at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station (Follow-up Information)

http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/press/corp-com/release/2013/1227506_5130.html

This is follow-up information regarding oil leakage from the unmanned heavy equipment, which occurred today (May 18).

The leakage of oil used for the control of the unmanned heavy equipment was inspected using a monitoring camera, and we have estimated the leakage area to be approx. 5m x 4m, and the leakage amount to be 20L.

As to the leakage source, it is currently considered that the leakage was caused by coming off of a control hose at the front end of a hydraulic cutter of the unmanned heavy equipment. We will find details later.

The unmanned heavy equipment has been placed on the gantry installed near the upper part of Unit 3 Reactor Building. Thus, the oil has been spreading on the gantry, which is sufficiently far from the spent fuel pool. Therefore, the oil does not affect the spent fuel pool.

How to treat the leaked oil is under consideration.