Event Notification Report for December 15, 2005

LOSS OF 38 OUT OF 67 EMERGENCY SIRENS DUE TO WEATHER

"During performance of weekly testing on ANS Sirens 38 of 67 sirens failed. Suspect due to inclement weather. Retested at 15:43 (EST) and currently 4 of 67 are inoperable. " Licensee notified Mecklenburg county.


NRC Resident Inspector was notified of this event by the licensee.

LOSS OF EMERGENCY SIREN POWER

"On December 15, 2005, at 0930 hours, it was determined that approximately 17 of 65 Oconee Nuclear Station emergency sirens, located in Pickens and Oconee Counties, failed to send a feedback signal when checked. It is postulated that these sirens are inoperable due to a loss of power attributed to severe icing conditions currently being experienced in both counties. At the time of discovery, current weather conditions were a steady light rain with a temperature of 33 degrees F.

"Duke is currently attempting to restore power to the affected sirens but does not expect to have all of the inoperable sirens back in service until later in the day. During the loss of siren period, a compensatory means of notifying the public has been put into place to include routing of local law enforcement personnel to the affected areas for public notification should an emergency occur at the station. Because more than 25% of the sirens were unavailable as a result of this event, this event constitutes a major loss of notification capability; consequently, this event is reported as an eight -hour notification in accordance with 10CFR50.72(b)(3)(xiii) reporting criteria.

"The licensee notified the NRC Resident Inspector and applicable station personnel.

"Initial Safety Significance: None. Compensatory measures have been put into place to ensure that the members of the public located in the affected areas are appropriately notified by local law enforcement personnel. All three Oconee units remain operable in Mode 1 (100 percent Power) and are unaffected by this condition.

"Corrective Action(s): Duke will attempt to have all of the inoperable sirens restored as soon as possible and will maintain the compensatory action in-place until full restoration has been completed."

* * * UPDATE ON 12/16/05 AT 1620 FROM JOHN COLLINS TO JOE O'HARA* * *

"On December 15, 2005, at 0930 hours, it was determined that approximately 17 of 65 Oconee Nuclear Station emergency sirens, located in Pickens and Oconee Counties, failed to send a feedback signal when checked. It is postulated that these sirens are inoperable due to a loss of power attributed to severe icing conditions currently being experienced in both counties. At the time of discovery, current weather conditions were a steady light rain with a temperature of 33 degrees F.

"Throughout the day and night of December 15th, additional sirens were lost. A maximum number of 40 sirens were eventually lost.

"On December 16th, 2005, at 0815 Emergency Planning contacted Oconee and Pickens County to assess the siren outage due to ice storm on 12-15-05 and the results of the assessment were that Pickens County still had 17 sirens out of service and Oconee County still had 9 sirens out of service due to the ice storm. The ONS resident NRC inspector was notified this morning at 0818 of the siren issue and all of his questions and concerns were answered. Duke Power Company Community Affairs was also notified.

"On December 16th, 2005, at 1509, Emergency Planning contacted Oconee and Pickens County. The results were that Pickens County still has 11 sirens out of service and Oconee County still has 2 sirens out of service due to the ice storm. This reduces the total number of sirens out of service to less than the threshold considered a major loss of offsite response capability per the 10CFR 50.72 notification requirements.

"Duke is currently attempting to restore power to all the affected sirens. Power is expected to be restored to the entire service area by Sunday.

"During the loss of siren period, a compensatory means of notifying the public was put into place to include routing of local law enforcement personnel to the affected areas for public notification should an emergency occur at the station.

"Initial Safety Significance: 12-16-05, Safety Significance has not changed. None. Compensatory measures have been put into place to ensure that the members of the public located in the affected service areas are appropriately notified by local law enforcement personnel. All three Oconee units remain operable in Mode 1 (100 percent power) and are unaffected by this condition.

"Corrective Action(s): Duke will attempt to have all the inoperable sirens restored as soon as possible and will maintain the compensatory action in-place until full restoration has been completed."

The R2DO(Decker) had been notified.

***** UPDATE ON 12/20/05 AT 1610 EST FROM RANDY TODD TO MACKINNON ******

"This update (December 20, 2005) is to report that all sirens have now been returned to service and tested.

"Duke has completed repairs to restore and test all sirens. Full restoration has been completed."

R2DO (Paul Fredrickson) notified.


NRC Resident Inspector will be notified of this update by the licensee.

LOST ELECTRON CAPTURE DETECTOR CONTAINING NI-63 SOURCE

The licensee reported that a electron capture detector (Perkin Elmer model # 0330-0119, serial # 2161) is declared lost as of 05/16/06. The detector contains a sealed 10 milliCi Ni-63 source (Ni-63 plated foil). The detector was being stored in a lab area used by the previous RSO and was thought at one time to have been returned to the manufacturer due to obsolescence of the detector. The detector was discovered missing in December 2005 and is believed to have been discarded in general waste in Spring 2005 during a reorganization of the facility.


THIS MATERIAL EVENT CONTAINS A "LESS THAN CAT 3" LEVEL OF RADIOACTIVE MATERIAL

Sources that are "Less than IAEA Category 3 sources," are either sources that are very unlikely to cause permanent injury to individuals or contain a very small amount of radioactive material that would not cause any permanent injury. Some of these sources, such as moisture density gauges or thickness gauges that are Category 4, the amount of unshielded radioactive material, if not safely managed or securely protected, could possibly - although it is unlikely - temporarily injure someone who handled it or were otherwise in contact with it, or who were close to it for a period of many weeks.

AGREEMENT STATE REPORT - MISSING RADIUM SOURCE

"Licensee representative reported a lost Liquid Scintillation Counter with associated Radium 226 source (removed from the location approx late December 2005). Authorized user [Deleted] surplused the LSC, LKS Model 1214, Liquid Scintillation Counter- SN 115, UNC Property Number 175899, Radium 226 source of 10 microcuries.

"The licensee representative searched for the LSC/source at UNC Chapel Hill Surplus Property, NC Surplus Property, and has interviewed individuals that may have purchased or acquired LSC, to no avail.

"Incident Assessment by IAT:

"There is no significant radiation exposure hazard, there is no significant radiation contamination hazard, and the event has been classified as LOW - Minimal or Low Risk in regards to persons, environment, and facilities/equipment at the facility."

NC Incident number: 06-05

This event was reported by the State of North Carolina voluntarily to the NRC, however, the NRC does not regulate Radium 226 at this time.

THIS MATERIAL EVENT CONTAINS A "LESS THAN CAT 3" LEVEL OF RADIOACTIVE MATERIAL

Sources that are "Less than IAEA Category 3 sources," are either sources that are very unlikely to cause permanent injury to individuals or contain a very small amount of radioactive material that would not cause any permanent injury. Some of these sources, such as moisture density gauges or thickness gauges that are Category 4, the amount of unshielded radioactive material, if not safely managed or securely protected, could possibly - although it is unlikely - temporarily injure someone who handled it or were otherwise in contact with it, or who were close to it for a period of many weeks.

This source is not amongst those sources or devices identified by the IAEA Code of Conduct for the Safety & Security of Radioactive Sources to be of concern from a radiological standpoint. Therefore is it being categorized as a less than Category 3 source