An alarm that lasted several minutes at the Indian Point nuclear power plant set neighbors on edge Thursday. Back in April, we mentioned that Entergy, the owner of the Indian Point nuclear power plant 40 miles north of the city, was fined $130,000 for failing to install an emergency warning system by a required deadline. This was just weeks after a fire in the facility's transformers tripped an automatic shutdown at one of the site's reactors––the second reactor shutdown that month. The two mishaps led to a downgrade in Indian Point's safety rating by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Indian Point was testing out that belated area warning system Thursday, when an employee "pushed the wrong button" and an intended silent test of the alarm caused 14 sirens to start wailing for several minutes. Local police received dozens of calls from frightened residents. Unsurprisingly, public confidence in the safety of a nuclear power plant so close to NYC continues to wane.
