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Director of Emergency Management McMahon Outlines Indian Point Evacuation Plan
County Legislators disagree about viability of plan
by Maria Theodore Leiter
The Indian Point 2 & 3 Nuclear Station in Buchanan, N.Y. has long been the subject of controversy. Well before the September 11 attacks, activists called for the decommissioning of the plant, which was built in 1972 and exists in a densely populated region. Recent reports that terrorists targeted nuclear plants in the U.S. has raised the debate to a fevered pitch.
Amidst the emotional deliberations, the Putnam County Bureau of Emergency Services has been charged with developing a workable evacuation plan to move 20,000 people who live within the ten-mile Emergency Planning Zone in the event of a nuclear disaster. According to Mario Rampolla, Director of Emergency Management for Putnam County, most of Cold Spring and Nelsonville lay outside the ten-mile radius, but are included in the EPZ because natural boundaries would be less confusing for the public than the actual ten-mile boundary line. On April 23, Commissioner Robert McMahon gave the Protective Services Committee of the Legislature an update of the Evacuation and Radiological Response Plan for Indian Point. Even among the small group of legislators and County employees, strong emotions came into play.
"I am not a proponent or opponent of nuclear power," said McMahon, "That’s not my job. My job is to make sure that this evacuation plan is based on sound principles."
The plan is a work in progress, explained McMahon. A major review and update of the 600-page document was begun on August 2001, based on new information available from the 2000 Census. In addition to population updates, new roadways have been added to the traffic plan. McMahon said that there were still elements that needed to be addressed. For instance, the County does not have a policy on the distribution of Potassium Iodide tablets because they are still waiting for answers from the State health department. The tablets prevent absorption of radiation by the thyroid. Because thyroid cancer was the most evident health effect linked to the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear meltdown in the Ukraine, besides the thirty deaths caused by high-level radiation exposure, many people advocate keeping a supply on hand and taking them in case of a radiation leak. According to a 1995 study by the World Health Organization, 700 incidents of thyroid cancer in children and adolescents and ten resulting deaths were directly attributed to the Chernobyl accident.
"The law department has a problem with handing out tablets to the general population," he said. Even if the medical answers were obtained from the health department, the question of how the pills should be distributed would remain. Legislator Vincent Tamagna said that the tablets posed a real threat of sending some people into anaphylactic shock and said that he would not want a school nurse administering the drug to his children.
The plan includes standards for evacuation that have evolved since the Three Mile Island nuclear plant accident in 1979. The 10-mile radius for evacuation is a result of this standardization. It was statistically determined by the NRC that given the fact that radiation carried by the wind tends to spread and disperse, becoming less concentrated in larger volumes of air or water, the potential for the kind of high-dose radiation that would result in fatalities after short-term exposure exists within a ten mile radius.
The farther away from the source one goes, the more the radiation is dispersed and poses less of an airborne health risk. The concentration of radioactive materials in the air beyond ten miles poses little risk to those beyond this radius, according to the NRC. Beyond ten miles, the risk is more from radiation settling into foodstuff, cow’s milk, drinking water and soil. For these contingencies, the recommended radius is fifty miles. In other words, the evacuation plan is not meant to remove all those who may be exposed to the long-term effects of radiation, but to move those who may be at risk of short term, high-level radiation.
In Putnam, this means the movement of approximately 19,476 people. Rockland County has to move 118,197, Westchester, 143,828 and Orange, 16,232 — a total 297,733 people who would need to be evacuated in a short time frame.
"How do we even know it’s the best we can do without a mock trial?" asked Legislator Sam Oliverio. McMahon said that even if a trial drill were possible, without the panic that would certainly accompany a real emergency, the results would be misleading.
The plan is reviewed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency and by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. FEMA is supposed to conduct bi-annual exercises for the purposes of determining whether the County can implement the plan. However, following the September 11 attacks, the majority of formal drills scheduled for Indian Point were postponed. The next drill is scheduled for September 2002.
McMahon outlined the classes of incidents involving plant safety at Indian Point in order of severity. The first is an Unusual Event. This is simply a plant incident without immediate release of radioactive material. The next is an Alert. This involves the limited release of radiation within the plant within EPA safe levels. A Site Area Emergency means that events are in progress that involve failure of plant functions needed for the protection of the public. Radiation released to the public is still below EPA safe levels. A General Emergency involves substantial core degradation or melting, with radiation release to the public above safe levels.
Plant officials are required to notify Putnam County within fifteen minutes of any of the above events. There is a dedicated phone line called the Radiological Emergency Communications System (RECS) that is connected to the Indian Point #2 & #3 Control Rooms and the Emergency Operations Center (EOC) in the basement of the County Building and the Sheriff’s Communications Facility. During normal work hours Entergy Control Room Operators would activate the RECS system to notify all four counties, and various other local and state agencies, and West Point Military Academy. During off hours, there is an alternate roster of persons to be notified, including the County Executive and the Commissioner of Emergency Services.
Upon notification of an Alert or higher level of incident, a notification process would commence that would include the County Executive, town Supervisors, Mayors, Legislative Chairman, the Putnam County School Coordinator and all department heads and agency representatives. All would be ordered to report to the Emergency Operations Center. These individuals would then decide on necessary actions to be taken, such as the closure of schools, notification or evacuation of the public, etc.
If it were decided that the public should be notified, sirens would be sounded within the 10-mile radius. Should the sirens fail, the Sheriff’s Department would send cars that would follow a route alert path and make announcements over their PA system. Sounding of the sirens is not an indication to the public to evacuate, but to tune into any of the EAS radio or TV stations, such as WABC-AM, WFAN-WM, and WCBS-TV. Instructions would be given over these stations. A siren test was conducted in March. This reporter, who lives in Cold Spring, could barely make out the sirens when they sounded. When asked about the decibel level, Robert Rogan, the Deputy Commissioner of Emergency Services, said that the sirens were tested at their full volume. For those who are in low decibel areas, or who have hearing difficulties, he said there were tone alert radios available throughout the county in public gathering places.
There are three locations designated to receive the public and which would be set up as decontamination sites. These are: The George Fisher Middle School on Fair Street in Carmel; Carmel High School on Fair Street in Carmel; and Brewster High School on Foggintown Road in Brewster. School children would be transported to Kent Elementary School in Kent. This is approximately 16 miles from Indian Point. This is perhaps the most controversial part of the plan, as many residents have expressed concern at the thought of being separated from their children at such a time. Legislator Sam Oliverio, who is also a School Assistant Principal, said that he believed people would run to the schools to get their children. Chairman Robert Pozzi disagreed. "As a parent, I am more concerned that my children are being taken care of."
The plan includes available vehicles and drivers to transport all children and transit dependant people. The total number of transit dependant people according to the census is 758. The total bus seating capacity is 1,440. McMahon said that in case bus drivers were not willing to report for duty, there is a list of volunteers willing to take their places. McMahon said he thought that contracted employees would live up to their responsibilities.
McMahon also said that a firm hired by Entergy would soon conduct an evacuation traffic study. Tamagna, who doubted that the firm would be objective, given who was paying the bill, was skeptical of this study. Tamagna said that the NRC was "nothing but a lap dog for big business."
McMahon’s presentation stopped short of explaining what contingencies are in place for the area outside of the ten-mile radius. For instance, how would food and water be transported to the reception sites for the evacuated public, and what long-term evacuation plans would be needed, since ground and water contamination would render a much larger area uninhabitable? Chernobyl caused the evacuation of over 220,000 people in a 4300 square kilometers (2,572 miles) radius. Putnam’s contingency planning covers the ten-mile EPZ. Beyond that, contingency planning in what is termed the Ingestion Pathway is the responsibility of the State. During a later interview, Director of Emergency Management Mario Rampolla told the PCN&R that the State conducts drills of this plan every six years. They also do regular testing of soil, water and plant life within this fifty-mile radius.
After the presentation, Tamagna, who recently announced that he would run for Assembly in the district that houses the plant, expressed grave misgivings about the evacuation plan.
"I don’t think this will work," he said. "Last week, a plane hovered around the plant for twenty minutes and no one knew about it. No one would have thought the twin towers would have collapsed… And when you have blueprints in Afghanistan… When you talk about all of the scenarios for a complete and total disaster… We should get together regionally and talk about how we can put our arms around this monster." He said that local officials should look at plans for decommissioning the plant. He added that he would be putting together an energy plan with alternatives to nuclear power. He noted that four non-nuclear plants would soon be going on line in the Hudson Valley.
Other legislators pointed out that regardless of popular outcries against the plant, the County needed to have a plan in place and that the Bureau of Emergency Services was doing the best that it could.
"We can’t make the decision to shut down," said Committee Chairman Terry Intrary. Only the Nuclear Regulatory Commission can make that decision. Indian Point is half way through its twenty-year license. The NRC would review that license in ten years to determine if plant aging has increased the likelihood of accidents. Also at that time they are supposed to consider the increased risk involved due to population increases.
"We hope we never need it," said Legislator Robert McGuigan. "We just hope that it works."
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