Hinsdale's I-5 Skagit River Bridge collapse

Yep, the top of the bridge...

Reposted on June 17, 2014

So I originally publish this on Friday July 30. I recently got arrested on multiple counts surrounding this bridge...5 counts including littering with a "Need New Bridge" sign.

So what is the total count of truck strike on the Hinsdale-Brattleboro bridges...I count 14. Eight being really serious. Why wasn't all this damage removed and replaced...brought back to the designer intent?

I-5 Skagit River Bridge collapse

 On May 23, 2013, at approximately 7:00 pm PDT, one span of the Interstate 5 bridge over the Skagit River at Mount Vernon, Washington State immediately collapsed into the river when it was struck by an over-height truck. Two other vehicles with three people fell with the span. The trapped people were rescued by boats.  

The vertical clearance for vehicles is limited by the portals and sideways sway structs. These are relatively low in older bridges. In Washington State bridges, the sway struts are often curved downwards at the outer ends, with less clearance above the outer lanes and outer shoulders. Tall loads then need to use the inner lanes for maximal clearance. These bridges are vulnerable to impacts by overheight vehicles, and such impacts were common. There was a known strike on this bridge that occurred on October 22, 2012, and investigators found evidence of several other impacts in years past.^[8] Bridge inspection reports dating back to the 1979 frequently note damage caused by over-height vehicles, and an inspection report from late 2012 noted a three-inch gash in the steel.^[9]

So I am beginning to document all the truck bridge strikes. This is a beginning...there has been horrible damage. And none of the severely damaged members have ever been repaired

There is tremendous energy liberated with truck bridge strikes. This is beginning in Brattleboro and on the right siding facing Hinsdale. The next pictures we will see from both sides of this damage protective lip...on the left hand side.

The below two severe damage is opposite sides of the same accident. This end of the bridge has tremendous footing bolt damage, destroyed footing and enormous corrosion to the metal attachment to the foundation. This moved the big truss...

This below is on the other side of the metal plate accident protrusion...you see the massive strike energy that bulged out this really thick metal. Why was't this replaced...there was a enormous transfer of strike energy to this huge main trust. There is a lot of damage underneath the deck and onto the footing. Who know when this happened?

This is called a diagonal member and it attached to gussets on both end. The below gusset is severely corroded  and the gusset itself is damaged from the crash.




Being bent like that means one or both gussets have been moved...along with anything attached to the trust you can see. This area near this severely diagonal member has stomach churning movement and vibration. The accident severely damaged this quarter of the bridge?

More of the same...

Same bridge below...next two pictures are the same strike..



This guy is bent from the front and back axis...

Check out the below bulgeing  gusset point...this is the result of the entrance and foundation sinking and sliding on the island sandbar.

Look at the massive bending of the top member...these two vertical members have to be slightly bent towards each other for that kind of bend. Tremendous damage to the bridge.

Ugly, ugly, ugly...enormous forces...both top beams bent.

Below, are these criss cross things really needed

Hinsdale Bridge Cover-up

Originally published on 6/14

There is an anomaly between the environmental assessment and the state count.

Average annual daily traffic counts in 2010 for the main artery between Hinsdale and Brattleboro stood at 9,700. Projected counts for 2032 increase to nearly 15,000.

Well, they estimated in 2012 the traffic volume would be 12,275 in 2015…

According to the NHDOT at Pierce Road and Brattleboro Road the average daily traffic rate was:

1) 2009 at 5300 vehicles a day

2) 2012 at 7300 vehicle

So it averages 667 vehicles a day increase per year.

Now the most recent Hinsdale bridge project estimates in 2013 it is 9700 vehicles per day…

That is a difference on average of 4400 more vehicles a day going across the Hinsdale Bridges in one year verses 667 vehicles on average a day per year in between 2009 and 2012.

You see the amazing increasing trends…the rate of change of vehicles going across the bridges are staggering.

*** 9700 vehicles per day gives us a 3.5 million (3,540,500) vehicles going across bridge in one year at a 2013 year rate.

This isn't including the "Tractor Supply" store and this place just opened.   

June 16

Ok, from my indigent perspective…where do we stand on the Hinsdale Bridge from the early summer of 2013? So they threw at us a new wooden walkway supported by the dangerously corroded metal support brackets. Everyone wants me to spin this in an optimistic manner…make us feel better than the situation actually is. All the alarm bells should be ringing when you hear the NHDOT placed the bridge on the 2014 ten year plan…the House passed the plan and the Senate won’t pass it. It is the typical political shenanigans over fully funding our transportation needs as we have seen for last thirty years about this bridge. It is a 1921 bridge and we are crazy using it today! What does that say about our greater society? One year our bridge is in on the ten year plan and the next it’s taken off. You make a little noise, you get back a political promissory “maybe” response which is never fulfilled. Oh please, love and vote for us even if we are incapable of effecting change!

Where we sit right now, in the beginning of the summer of 2014 considering the political shenanigans in Concord and Washington…never has it been more pessimistic that we will get this bridge replaced in time in order to save the economies Hinsdale and the surroundings. This is going to end up terribly disrupting the lives of most of us, as it is always is with these things, it is more going to destroy the lives of the poor and weak more than the well off.   

The local population is incapable of making the necessity level of political noise (attention getting tools) commiserate with the value of this transportation corridor and this bridge. You don't truely understand the value of this transpotation corridor. The background noise with events going on in Concord and Washington are so loud…they are incapable of hearing the little peeps of our vital societal needs and providing it for us. We are in the same boat as everyone else is.

You know, just go back to your happy beer drinking and summertime picnics…everything is beautiful.

This is my humble assessment of our pathetic plight!

The below picture was taken and placed on my blog in around the summer of 2013. The bridge is held up like a table with four legs...this is one of legs. The picture doesn't do the missing metal justice in the rust ring about this huge bolt. There is a enormous amounts of metal missing in this rust ring that is corroded away. Check out the white salt marks?

2013

Just checking, had my son take this below picture for me this spring about a week ago (2014). I am legally restricted from being this close to the bridge, well I have to keep moving. The pictures were taken one year apart. It is the exact same rusted bolt as the above. This is called major repairs on our bridge by our NHDOT. The NHDOT carelessly painted the bolt towards the end of summer 2013. They are suppose to sand blast all the rust away, put a primer on and then the regular coat. Look at the "rust through" in the new half ass paint job in "way less" than one year.

I am probably only one in the world with the capabilities of creating and capturing this by photography...provoking the NHDOT. It is a very sorry situation!!!!

But the NHDOT is paying attention to me...

(By the way, it is much like what the NRC is doing today with the nuclear industry.)

Spring 2014

 

I am so proud as hell of my hard work...

 

The NHDOT 2013 paint job is equivalent to Obama's quality and size of his infrastructure and jobs new program...

 

I believe this is the north side... the other side of  the nut above! Check out those missing rivet heads...there are dissolved rivet heads and bolts all over this bridge!

 

 

My bridge protest in Maybe 2011 or 2012?

 

 

 

 A gusset took out the Minneapolis bridge...the below is a bridge gusset.

 

 

 

 

This is a embedded bolt holding the roadbed deck to the concrete footing.

 

 

 

Beginning a gallery of dissolved and corroded rivets, bolts and nuts?

 

 

Who is in pajamas and asleep?

 

Wake up! Wake up! Wake up!

 

 

 

 

 

This is one of the brackets holding up the new wooden walkway that I made them replace! It holds up the walkway!

 

Actually this is the walkway...

 

 

I don' remember below where I got this from.

 

 

 

 

Inside our Hinsdale NH Town Hall in the fall 2013...in public meeting with the NHDOT about replacing our bridge after I was arrested.

 

 

 

 

 

 This is the concrete pedestal holding up "the other leg" of the table!

 

 

 



Transcript Aug 2013: Bridge Environmental Assessment Meeting in Brattleboro

I am getting dam sick and tired with this guy talking with phrases like: "you know" and "stuff like that". This article would be half as long if he could just dump those phrases from his speech!

Sneaky Corruption: I very leery with engineers and PhDs using their education and their professional stature to justify reducing the engineering standards of a bridge instead of maintaining and enforcing the original standards…especially in this case, where we are massively increasing the duty, traffic and loads of the bridge over nine decades.

" I want you guys to expect everybody to start digging dirt in the spring of next year (2014)."

MR. MULLIGAN: First of all, the characterization of the traffic on the bridge is Incomplete as far as the -- you said that barely two trucks couldn't pass the -- on the Hinsdale Bridge, and actually only one truck at a time can easily --can pass the bridge. Also, I'm interested on both sides of the bridge, to the geometry issue, --

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: -- can go on, and so the truck has to stick its nose way out in the traffic, and there's all sorts of issues with – of obstructing traffic. These trucks going out there, (unclear), stuff like that, so that sort –

MS. O'LEARY: And geometrically, right, there are definitely issues with both bridges and approach-ways. That is documented in the EA, as I said, and I think that it said that two bridges can't -- or two trucks can't pass at the same time, that's the difficulty, if they need to, that's what we're trying to fix, and they can't right now, so you're correct only that one at a time, under certain conditions at certain parts of Route 19 across the bridge, that is correct.

MR. MULLIGAN: And cars –

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

 MR. MULLIGAN: -- a car can't pass a tractor-trailer on the bridge where it approaches, and stuff like that.

MS. O'LEARY: On either?

MR. MULLIGAN: On either, right, right, so that we know. And also, that the greater issue is – the core issues of the bridge, you know, my side of the story is, I want you guys to expect everybody to start digging dirt in the spring of next year.

MS. O'LEARY: Hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: The socio-economic issue of it, or a bridge shut-down, or the -- restricting the weight on the bridges, and all that sort of stuff, --

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: -- will be tremendous as far as both communities; and also hindering as far as growth and business growth, and stuff like that, is a great concern if the bridges are allowed to stand as they are.

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: As far as 2010, there were 7200 vehicles per day, --

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: -- and 2012, there were 10,000 vehicles per day, and in 2015 -- you want me to correct -- projects 13,000 vehicles a day, --

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: -- and that's a tremendous increase in vehicle traffic. We don't know what the break-out is as far as trucks and stuff like that.

MS. O'LEARY: Right.

MR. MULLIGAN: On the -- the bigger problem again is the condition of the bridges. I think it is grossly-inaccurate in your report and also the DOT. I see tremendous bridge-type issues on the bridge. There's tremendous member of bending and gusset-bending and gusset-weakening, and the – the side -- the thing that's in the gusset is half-an-inch, --

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: -- and there's another half-inch or less on the outside, so how can New Hampshire even consider construction and integrity of the gusset? These bridges, as you know, are critical -- are both critical, --

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: -- both (unclear), or both critical, or both (unclear), whatever it is.

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: A gusset goes and the whole bridge goes in the drink. So we have the footing (phonetic) problems, the Brattleboro west side bridge, that whole -- additions, the dirt, and everything, is all shifting.

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: And there's gusset movement and bending and stuff like that.

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: And indicates that there's been movement of that side of the bridge, and stuff like that. But everybody's playing, you know, let's make believe, this is the way it is, and nobody wants to go down there and really look at that bridge –

MS. O'LEARY: So you feel that we over --even though we're saying it's structurally-obsolete and functionally-obsolete, you're feeling that we're over-estimating the safety of the bridge is your comment.

MS. MULLIGAN: By many magnitudes.

MS. O'LEARY: Okay.

MR. MULLIGAN: And -- and like I said, when this issue of all these members meeting, --

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: -- all these super-structure members being bended, tremendous damage, tremendous bending of these members, and stuff like that, would that be critical, a bridge like that -- one of those things would go and the whole bridge could go in. As long as the -- they indicated with the footings and the huge truss knuckles underneath the bridge, there's a tremendous amount of wastage (phonetic) on those knuckles and bolts that hold the trusses together, and stuff like that, along that. So you have the members that are bent and huge areas of these trusses -- well, not huge, --

Ms. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: -- let's say, the huge trusses, themselves, are bent and will be opened up, and stuff, along with all that stuff underneath it. How do we know that New Hampshire DOT really understands these two interactions together, how do we really know that these bridges are going to last for another 50 years? Because the way it's going now, New Hampshire isn't going to change their politics, and -- and they're starving their transportation budgets, right, --

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: -- stagnation and starving for the last 30 years. They can't pass -- you know, that bridge is unsafe, they can't pass it, to shut it down if it's unsafe, right? And so the gap, the gap of these two things, you know, these New Hampshire officials don't have the courage, they'll face tremendous political outcome if they had to shut that bridge down. And so -- and so the gap, the gap, between these two things, these two impossibilities, is they falsify documents.

MS. O'LEARY: Well, I certainly can't speak to that, and I can tell you that we don't have any falsified documents in here, and unfortunately I can't speak to the New Hampshire budget, either, but bridges are rated on an engineering scale that's used across the country for safety. And so they did score low in the 40s, definitely, which is why they're in line to be fixed, but it's not made-up reasons, there's definitely -- there's criterias, and there's -- specific things get checked on every bridge, and so that has been done, and that's why we have the numbers in the 40s.

MR. MULLIGAN: All I say -- one more thing –

MS. O'LEARY: Yeah.

MR. MULLIGAN: -- is that that's a near collapse, we're going to break apart, where that bridge is so fragile, there's so many degraded parts, the super-structure underneath the bridge. The New Hampshire -- the DOT, they come with these fancy words about engineering, and stuff, and degrees, and Master's Degrees and Ph.Ds, and you can -- you can baloney the people, and stuff, with, you know, the institutional stuff with the engineers and educators, and stuff like that, and at the end of the day, you're not asking proof of these guys, they're just throwing you -- they're just throwing you trash and words, and stuff like that, and they're not showing you any of the events that are really going on, and stuff. And so just by throwing out (unclear) the professional class, and –

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: -- and you don't have to have (unclear) from us, we'll just -- we'll go on our statute and our sense of professionalism. A guy like me, they don't ask -- they ask like what's your proof, what's your proof that that bridge is going to go down, and stuff like -- they ask me triplicate proof, they simply -- you know, they don't trust me. The professional class, they -- they trust them to be infinite, you know, as far as that, so – and there you go.

MS. O'LEARY: All right, well, thank you for your comments.

MR. MULLIGAN: Thank you.


***MR. MULLIGAN: There -- my friends in Hinsdale are wondering why I'm not in jail tonight, and maybe I should be. It's associated with the walkway, --

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: -- the walkway's been in terrible condition.

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: The State has known that the walkway, they have loose boards on the walkway. And I've seen a (unclear) from Brattleboro, they go to the convenience store, and there's two or three people with wheelchairs that uses that walkway. It's unavailable in the wintertime because nobody wants to snow-blow it.

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: A lot of fear that the bridges would collapse if there's a lot of heavy vehicles, or machines, and stuff like that. And so they've had a recent inspection. The bridge, they had actually two inspections, last fall and this spring, and stuff, and -- and a thorough inspection, more or less, --

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR.MULLIGAN: -- but they didn't catch the bridge walkway. They didn't catch all the dangerous boards that were loose, and, you know, as you're --you go with a bicycle, and you go lap-lap-lap-lap-lap, there are loose boards, and I'm the expert at knowing something in boards in Hinsdale because I threw a bunch of them in the river yesterday. And so the thing is, really the thing is, is that you can't trust the State, you cannot trust the State to do an inspection. You can -- they're too politically-controlled, and stuff like that. That the walkway is a metaphor for how the New Hampshire DOT handles oversight and inspections, and it's like I said, there's a prime example that they couldn't take that -- I was on there this spring with the inspectors, the bridge inspectors, and talking to them, and stuff like that. I explained to them how dangerous these boards are and how the hundreds of thousands of people -- and that's what I'm saying, hundreds of thousands of people who have gone past me, and who I've submitted, and who I've thrown kisses at and -- by the way, females and males, and an assortment of antics, --

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: -- and stuff like that, how, you know, how dangerous it is, the conditions are dangerous.

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: What's more dangerous with the State of New Hampshire Department of Transportation, they cannot fill out paperwork accurately. They -- the bridgeway -- the walkway, and stuff like that, which I handle myself by throwing boards over, and made it impassable, and they had a, you know, a -- they couldn't come down on their own, fix it right, they have a bridge (unclear) do the work that the New Hampshire Department of Transportation should have done, and stuff. And so, you know, you watch a movie, you see these movies where there's been terrible bridge accidents, right? –

MS. O'LEARY: Hm-hmm.

MR. MULLIGAN: -- and in all of them, there's always an angel hanging around the bridge before the collapse, I'm that bridge angel, thank you.

MS. O'LEARY: Thank you, Mike.

Hinsdale Bridge Vibrations

2009@5300 vpd  for a year gives us 1.9 million cars

2012@7300 vpd    2.7 million cars

2013@ 9700 vpd    3.5 million cars

2015@12775 vpd  4.7 million cars

There is an anomaly between the environmental assessment and the state count.

Average annual daily traffic counts in 2010 for the main artery between Hinsdale and Brattleboro stood at 9,700. Projected counts for 2032 increase to nearly 15,000.

Well, they estimated in 2012 the traffic volume would be 12,775 in 2015…

According to the NHDOT at Pierce Road and Brattleboro Road the average daily traffic rate was:

1) 2009 at 5300 vehicles a day

2) 2012 at 7300 vehicle

So it averages 667 vehicles a day increase per year.

Now the most recent Hinsdale bridge project estimates in 2013 it is 9700 vehicles per day…

That is a difference on average of 4400 more vehicles a day going across the Hinsdale Bridges in one year verses 667 vehicles on average a day per year in between 2009 and 2012.

You see the amazing increasing trends…the rate of change of vehicles going across the bridges are staggering.

*** 9700 vehicles per day gives us a 3.5 million (3,540,500) vehicles going across bridge in one year at a 2013 year rate.

This isn't including the "Tractor Supply" store and this place just opened. 

June 16: 

It is common knowledge to everyone in our surroundings our bridges bounces up and down and sways terribly as cars a trucks use the bridge. People in buses notice it when they are stopped on the middle of the bridge, as with everyone in the cars. It makes everyone terribly nervous! Everyone involved with this should spend time on the walkway of the bridge.

The enormously dangerous situation most people don't "get"... understand ...is the traffic volume across this bridge is trending up at a fast rate. The rate of change intensified with the new Walmart and now the recent business development such a "Tractor Supply". It is going up a a fast rate. God knows what is going on in other development. And many big corporation look at the functionality of the Hinsdale bridge with future economic development and better jobs. Why build a big and expensive facility next to a dilapidated bridge that you need to get to the interstate. You can't predict the life of the 1921 bridge based on the traffic rate of two years ago. This is absolute and utter insanity! Just think of the increase of tractor trailers and cars these bridges have seen in the last few years coming out of these stores...

Right, people who hate government so much they are domestic terrorist...instead of aiming 911 airplanes at NYC skyscrapers, they blow up our government by defunding it and turning everyone else against government.

I do get it, not many media people have the technical capibilities to be able to protray these events to the public in a way they understand...

And a trillion dollars wasted on Iraq and climbing...

 

Originally posted on 9/26/13

 

Sept 30: This kind of crap is going on throughout NH government...these are domestic terrorist trying to disassemble NH government... 

　

NH Corrections: “We often wonder where the breaking point is going to be,” he said.

NHDOT: This is a message I got out of him: “Many years ago when I first got here we had about 120 employees. We have now around 70 employees.

N.H. Corrections Staff Feels Budget Losses

By Jeremy Blackman

Concord Monitor

Monday, September 30, 2013
(Published in print: Monday, September 30, 2013)

Concord — Patrick Bettens didn’t become a corrections officer for the overtime. But in the past six years, as budget constraints and declining staff counts have gripped the New Hampshire Department of Corrections, it has become a defining facet of his career. Nearly every week Bettens is asked or told with little advance notice to tack four, sometimes eight hours onto at least one of his five eight-hour evening shifts.

Walk into any division of the state prison and one theme will eventually surface: getting by with less. Education and vocational training programs have fewer instructors, industry facilities are open fewer hours per day, mental health and substance abuse services have been trimmed, correctional councilors are in short supply.

It seems unlikely it will get any easier. According to Department of Corrections spokesman Jeffrey Lyons, the department’s operating budget for the 2012-13 biennium was cut by $13 million after it passed, and the new, 2014-15 budget is $2 million less than that.

“We certainly have gone past trimming the fat and gone into cutting into the meat of the system,” Bettens said.

The Effects

His division has perhaps felt the greatest strain. Corrections Major Jon Fouts, who oversees security at the state prison, estimated that he’s lost more than 100 officers — about a third of his staff — through layoffs and attrition in recent years. As a result, he and other watch commanders are left with few options other than to compel existing officers to working extra hours just to meet what he called “safe minimal” staffing.

Security is not in jeopardy, Fouts insisted, but morale and workplace effectiveness has taken a hit.

“We often wonder where the breaking point is going to be,” he said.

Overtime expenses have also blown a hole in the department’s budget, swallowing nearly $8 million in the last two years and projected to do much the same through 2015, according to legislative finance documents.

Between 2004 and 2012, the department eliminated nearly 250 positions, including 25 percent of its corrections staff and instructors, 52 percent of its administrators, 22 percent of shop supervisors and 17 percent of its correctional counselors and case managers. The department had 97 staff vacancies last year, according to department records.

Despite the reductions, about 75 percent of the Corrections budget is allocated for personnel expenses.

“Other departments have been asked to live in their means, but the Department of Corrections is at a disadvantage, in my opinion, because when times get worse their job grows in demand,” he said.

Feb 27:

There was one more issue I wanted to talk about but forgot to mention it. If a problem ever came up that your bosses wouldn't let you touch and your conscience still bothers you...I could be a conduit to leak NHDOT documents and issues to the public. I am a well know nuclear whistleblower. A lot a employees leaked document or issues to me. I raised publicly a lot of big issues. I told them in order to protect your identify, I would gladly go to jail indefinitely before I would give up you name. You need a really sexy issue to get the public's attention...something really controversial.

The largest whistleblower issue I ever singerly instigated...it was American Tissue and  it involved $500 million dollars. Put a lot of bad guys in jail. I am afraid of nothing (except my wife).

I talked to Dave this morning. He was a really nice guy.  We talked for an hour or so...he would have let me talked longer if I wanted too.

He says the vibrations are normal. They basically stand up on the deck during an inspection...if it doesn’t sway or vibrate noticeable it gets passed. I basically said vibrations are an indicator of bridge deterioration.  I am one for science...I need a detector measuring and recording vibration for a prolonged period of time. Then you monitor the vibration trends. He basically said there are no state and federal requirements with vibrations or movement requirements. I’d like to see them do a vibration test once a year.

So what is the science and engineering that guides the NHDOT into making a judgment about the strength of a totally 1921 rusted gusset? They would remove old rusted gussets,  then measure the forces it would take to when a gusset fails. Right, an assortment of rusted gusset, maybe even intentionally corroded, maybe rusted 10%, 20% or 50%, whatever, rusted in a assortment of areas (top)...where we got the data, science and engineering knowledge to be assured we know "when" a rusted gusset would fail.

Check out the vertical member...there are holes that are just corroded through the iron beam. Look at the rivet heads...you got to know a lot less force than when new would pop those rivets  So we see a diagonal and vertical rusted member attached to the gusset...along with the vertical outside member...with all that rust, how do we really know the real force it would take to fail these connecting members?

 Basically they are washing away the uncertainty(not disclosing) on these degraded areas...while unjustly amplifying the certainty (the wasted away top doesn't matter) with the gusset's structural integrity.

  Got any independent academic reports or government studies...destructive testing... on the integrity of rusted gussets like this? When an old rust gusset will fail?

We talked about my grossly corroded gusset...he says it mostly on the top. It hasn’t much degraded the strength of gusset. They are working on getting a sonic metal detector to inspect the gussets with heavy rust. I asked him according the Minneapolis NTSB findings on their bridge collapse...did you carry out the required gusset inspections. He said they did!

Come on, that horizontal runner under the gusset...from footing to footing all across the bridge..with all that debris and dirt covering up the member, how strong is that member? Right, that dirt or debris says wet for a long time, along with the salt...you know that is a intensely corroded area. 

Don't get you panties wet...I took these picture in the spring...

They are still in the 19^th century paperwork world...all their paperwork isn’t digitized yet.

I told Dave the NHDOT is as much a victim to our dysfunctional political process as Hinsdale NH...

...I decided  to bug the NHDOT about bridge movement, sway and vibration today. I always had issues in any NHDOT agency getting to talk to the right person. Once you say I got a problem, then all you get is everyone is out of the office.

I called the district 4 people asking to talk about the Hinsdale Bridge vibration problems. She said nobody is in right now, can I take you name and number? I say irked, I leave my name and number, then nobody ever gets back to me. There is a pause; she then says maybe you need to speak to Mark Richardson over in bridge inspection and she gives me the number. I call up the number for inspections,  but bridge new construction office answers. I give him my spiel, he says the bridge inspection office is not available...we are just answering their phones. I go into irked, I always have so much trouble getting to talk to the right people in any NH agency.  He says are budgets are tight, bridge inspection only has one secretary, and she is out. So we got into a little conversation about the NHDOT. Anyways Mark is not around, you can call him in the morning...but the real guy to talk to is Dave Powelson.

This is a message I got out of him: “Many years ago when I first got here we had about 120 employees. We have now around 70 employees. He says they perform an inadequate amount of inspection on new bridge construction...we are so overloaded and overwhelmed we can’t adequately vet the designs and oversee even the construction of new bridge. Many things are getting passed us.

This is the “ New Hampshire Advantage”...

Grand Gulf is Going bonkers on us?

Welcome Grand Gulf to the world of Pilgrim and Palisades...didn't they have a power uprate of late?

Huge plant: Grand Gulf's reactor is the most powerful in the United States, with a core power of 4408 MWth[1] yielding a nominal gross electrical output of about 1500 MWe.

Grand Gulf Station, a supplemental inspection team is being chartered - White PI for Unplanned Scrams per 7000 Critical Hours

Submitted by NUCBIZ on June 13, 2014 - 14:43

by Bob Meyer

June 12, 2014, The NRC Director's office sent out a memorandum to Jim Drake, Senior Reactor Inspector, Plant Support Branch 2, Division of Reactor Safety designating him as the team leader for the Supplemental Inspection Team.

Since December 29, 2012 to March 29, 2014, the station experienced six unplanned scrams.
As a result of the licensee experiencing three unplanned scrams between December 29, 2012, and January 14, 2013, the Performance Indicator for “Unplanned Scrams per 7000 Critical Hours,” crossed the threshold into White. The following are the descriptions of each of these scrams:

December 29, 2012 - Scram from 100% due to phase A unit differential signal resulting in a main generator lockout and turbine trip

January 4, 2013 - Scram from 94% power due to a phase A unit differential signal resulting in a main generator/turbine trip. Returned to 100% power on January 11

January 14, 2013 - Scram from 100% power due to a turbine generator trip caused by a generator neutral time overcurrent relay tripping. Commenced startup activities on January 27

The licensee had originally indicated that they were prepared for the IP 95001, “Supplemental Inspection for One or Two White Inputs in a Strategic Performance Area,” to be performed in August 2013. However, the licensee experienced another reactor scram (below), which resulted in their request to delay the inspection while they evaluated this new event against the planned actions that they had developed for the previous events.

July 30, 2013 - Scram from 100% power due to high reactor pressure. Cause was a failure of the B turbine stress evaluator (TSE) transmitter

On February 28, 2014, the licensee notified the NRC that they were ready for the IP 95001 inspection.

Subsequently, the licensee experienced two more reactor scrams.

March 17, 2014 - Operators inserted a manual scram from 41 percent thermal power due to a steam leak in the turbine building

March 29, 2014 - Scram from 87% power due to a main generator load reject, resulting in a turbine control valve fast closure

As a result, the licensee contracted an outside firm to perform an independent evaluation of these events and the licensee’s proposed corrective actions.

This supplemental inspection is being performed to obtain a better understanding of each of the referenced events; to assess the licensee’s understanding and response; and to assess whether all underlying contributing causes were appropriately considered and evaluated in the development of the licensee’s corrective actions.

Preemptory Blue Ribbon National Commission on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission

June 22: It is 1.7 trillion dollars...so that is another 140 nuclear plant for a total of 340 nuclear plants.

What are we talking about, 70% of the electricity we use in the USA? 

June 21: 

So we spent a trillion dollars ($1,000,000,000) on Iraq…we and the world got nothing out of it. Ok, 5 $billion per new nuclear plant. We could build 200 standard size nuclear plants with the best of technology,  with the cost of the Iraq war not including Afghanistan. I get it, the war is like a giant public works program except we got to kill 100,000s of people. It a is public works and jobs program without the ability to enjoy the fruits of our labor and taxes.

We could have shut down our obsolete operating nuclear plants while doubling the capacity of nuclear sector. Basically all our economy would have to pay for is the fuel and upkeep of the new plants for the next 60 years...   

June 16: Mr Meyer has remove his entry from his webs site?

Mr Meyers is saying these plants have a set budget for the operations. If they are spending money on Fukushima, they are withholding funds from training for the same budget.

President Obama and VP Biden,  thi is a cry for help deep within the nuclear industry for a National Commission on the NRC:  

Initial Licensed Operator Exams - Lowest Pass Rate in Five Years - INPO Reveals Shortcomings

Submitted by NUCBIZ on June 14, 2014 - 08:08

By Bob Meyer

Information is available from the NRC website for all the numbers. The industry on the whole is failing on training. Fukushima rigor does not apply in training, a predicted outcome by PROS that training would suffer, hence plant performance will decline. Fukushima resource requirements make other areas of the nuclear model weaker.

INPO/NRC meeting I revealed the disaster of the Initial Licensed Operator Training Programs and the training programs endevour to conform to the NRC inconsitent regional requirements. My exposé stated that as an industry, we are not doing well managing our resources. High failure rates, poor programs, lesson plans out of date, line that does not have the manpower to see an initial class through. These are not new concerns. It is often a revelation to many managers, INPO and the NRC that the Initial Licensed Operator classes are performed on back shift, midnights. An often asked question, "How would you perform going to college on the midnight shift?" INPO and the NRC staff appear to be disconnected. If you have a dual unit plant, you should be required to have a dual unit simualtor (DC Cook). Single units need two simluators to keep trianing programs from double bunking. Simulator training is the choke point.

The new document issued by INPO on June 12, 2014 concerning deficiencies in training clearly shoots INPO in the foot. Ineffective in ensuring a 10CFR50.120 requirement is met, the systematic approach to training breakdown, not following training procedures (T.S. Violation). This is the best job INPO has done in delineating short comings for the second time. As I see it INPO is in noncompliance with the 2012 Memorandum of Understanding with the NRC. This Memorandum allows the NRC to pass off regulatory oversight to INPO (Board of Directors all Industry CEOs or equiv.) may be a big mistake for nuclear safety.

Fukushima, Chernobyl, and TMI happened for different reasons, but they all have one thing in common.

This article does not reflect the views of the Professional Reactor Operator Society. This is an opinion.

 Show me one issue that would show how corrupts the NRC is…I would point to how the NRC didn’t do a public operability determination on the Palisades primary coolant pump.

It is risk perspectives, it makes all rules plastic.

June 12 NYT blog: Lochbaum offered this reaction:

First, the good news. The indications of elevated tritium levels strongly suggest a leak of radioactively contaminated water from Indian Point (it’s not irrefutable evidence of an ongoing or recent leak since it could be past leakage finally reaching the monitoring wells due to recent rainfall.) This is good news in the sense that all the monitoring wells are fairly recent additions to the site. More than 12 years ago, leakage would either not have been detected or only detected after people started dying, a la Love Canal. So, strange as it seems, awareness is a good thing. It provides time to implement measures to protect people and the environment.

Turning to the bad news, the NRC needs to get off the bench and into the regulating game. All the rhetoric about 20,000 picocuries per liter and neighbors drinking two quarts a day for a year is totally irrelevant.

N.R.C.’s regulations do not allow a drop of radioactively contaminated water to leave Indian Point except via monitored and controlled pathways. Even if the monitoring wells constituted a monitored pathway (which they don’t despite the name), it’s not a controlled pathway. Thus, N.R.C.’s regulations are being violated. But N.R.C. does not enforce those regulations. N.R.C. could impose a fine of $130,000 per day. That would give Entergy ample incentive to quickly find the leak (and stop the fine tally) and to implement steps to prevent future leaks (and future fines).

But nooooo. The N.R.C. instead invoked the “no blood, no foul” rule and becomes Entergy’s ally in allowing ongoing leaks (and ongoing crimes.)

The regulations were adopted following a public rulemaking process. That process allowed the public to chime in if the proposed regulations seemed too tame. The process allowed owners to chime in if the proposed regulations seemed too onerous. The final regulations adopted by the N.R.C. by definition became Goldilocks standards, neither too harsh nor too lean.

The regulations are essentially three-way contracts between the N.R.C., plant owners, and the public. The regulations protect owners from the N.R.C. requiring more stringent, and more costly, measures. The regulations should protect the public from the N.R.C. accepting less than compliance with the regulations.

But the N.R.C. is breaching its contract with the public around Indisn Point. It is allowing Entergy to leak radioactively contaminated water from Indoan Point as long as that leakage dies not kill people.

The N.R.C. should enforce its regulations or change its name to N.C. For the R in N.R.C. stands for Regulatory and the N.R.C. needs to do something to deserve such labeling or the FTC [Federal Trade Commission] should get after them for false advertising.

I documented the regulations the N.R.C. had established but the ignored in my September 2010 report Regulatory Roulette.

Originally posted on 6/9

(I am always in a  continuing process to update this entry and fix my errors. I will cue you into I changed something.)

June 13: This would be the accident I’d be concerned about with large scale popping of pins and freeing up large amounts of reactivity. This kind of accident would emerge within a few seconds. We’d still have the rods out and supplying feed water to the core. Many fuel pellets would be exposed to the water and moderator...would be freed from the cladding. You would have that cascade accident with one assembly after another being damaged. We would have a tremendous insertion of reactivity...the end result would be a steam explosion.(hyperbole) It might have enough energy to blow off the reactor head, remember the exploding Fukushima plants...then it would disperse fuel all over the local environments.   

SL-1

You should talk to me about the Vermont Yankee event I exposed with their one “pin”  in core steam explosion. It tore open the cladding of one pin and dispersed pellets into the coolant. Coolant leaked into the pin surrounding the fuel pellets, they pulled a rod nearby...which caused the fuel pellets to overheat and created the opportunity of a nuclear reactivity steam explosion.   

Ok, this is the smart question...this is the cover-up.

Salem 2 PCP potential event

(fixed this up a bit on 6/11)You notice the pump seizure with a bolt is an issue with Salem and threatening fuel damage, while a 5 by 12 inch impeller blade, with the lost blade being an inch thick, is not analysed as pump seizure stoppage accident at Palisades. The disparity between these two plant's accident analysis are shocking.

Fuel assembly:

So a fourth of the water flow in the core quickly stops...hot spot and areas where there is higher local power levers begin to quickly heat up. May be one fuel pin burst open, may be 10 pins burst open, may be a whole fuel assembly's pins burst open... You could consider any fuel pellet coming in contact with coolant water as super moderated and being able to quickly generate a lot more power and heat than normal at normal power operations. If don’t think it would take a lot of fuel pellets to put out so much power and heat only steam and water vapor would remain in the assembly. So that would cause addition pins to pop. Say the majority of pins popped in a assembly, the pins would be scrambled in the assembly, the fuel pellets would congregate at the bottom of the assembly and clog up the flow. Does those broken fuel pellets at the bottom of the assembly end with in a local "steam explosion", then bend and damage the assembly through the tremendous heat and power being produced there? Is there enough energy in the steam and vapor to seriously damage the neighbor assembly?  It is the beginning of a cascaded where pins in another neighbor assembly start to pop and damage the assemble, then another, then another. In this process we might not have scrammed yet.

How the assemblies are nestled together:

May be one, two or three assemblies get destroyed, maybe a rod can’t get all the way in the core...but the nuclear reaction stop. diverse cooling to the core is never threatened. What emergency classification would you be in? It would telegraph to outsider how serous the accident is. There is going to be a tremendous amount of freed radioactivity in the core if just one assemble gets destroy...lots if only one or two pins are destroyed. It is going to be a nasty cleanup of the core and it would be questionable if it is worth the price of a cleanup. But there would be little off plant release of radiation.

How do you think the outsiders would portray this? The antinukes would say there was a core meltdown. The NRC and plant would say they were always safe. This is just normal and expected. The UFSAR and plant licencing allows this. Can you imagine the media and political debate out of this?

Thanks NEI. Fuel pins or rods:

See, basically risk perspective only protects us from a severe core melt...this was mostly a small partial core meltdown with diverse core cooling always available. That is what they mean when they say its safe...safe mean less than severe core meltdown and it wouldn’t happen very often. I saying the political and public fallout would be severe, industry threatening...but it is all really a small partial meltdown. See how the nuclear industry doesn’t protect themselves from such a close near death experience and risk traumatizing a significant segment of our population. One, two, or three destroyed assemblies would be defined a safe and acceptable...but the outsiders would think you are bsing them on a meltdown and loss of another plant.

I am just saying this would be a severely painful and damaging event for the nation... but the NRC treats a partial core meltdown as a walk in the park in their analysis. Risk perspective does not capture public and political risk...it just looks at not having a severe core melt and limiting its off site release.  Risk perspectives should carry public credibility or political fallout and limiting a severe core melt and resultant unacceptable off site doses. All this is a profit!  

The problem is, most media outlets don’t have the money to hire nuclear expert reporters. There just is not a big audience for this. So they have to depend on a very limited group of experts for advice.  

You might have a good story...the reporter has no idea what you are talking about. The nukes don’t talk, they only have a limited amount of pro safety people. So they don’t know what you are talking about...that defaults into looking for a so called credentialed experts. Who says they know what their talking about, even if they got a engineering degree or PhD? That what their lawyers need. If they still don’t get it...the safest thing is to drop the story. They are always inclined to drop the story. More than not today, news is entertainment driving circulation...it is unrelated to what information you really need about the world today.  

So lets see, I sent an e-mails to Senator Shaheen, Senator Markey, President Obama and VP Biden Enformable...

How do you contact the NYT with a story idea?

June 10: Bam...got the managing editor of the NYT Mr. Baquet on my side?

I know, just throwing a pebble in a ocean's worth of internet data...

(Shit…I made a spelling or word mistake to the president and VP :) Was the word I was looking for preemptory or peremptory. I hate English, but it is the only language I know? I think I got it right. I was hoping I was going to look smarter than I am.).

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And ABC news...

Also Aljazeera and The Japan Times...

Washington Post...

Dear Senator Shaheen, 
 

To Sarah_Holmes@shaheen.senate.gov

 

Today at 9:27 PM

 

Dear Senator Shaheen,

 

Could I get your help with asking president Obama to set up a “Preemptory Blue Ribbon National Commission on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission? We had a set of recent very troubling events in the nuclear industry...Millstone’s loss of all outside electricity being one of them among others. Please look over my blog at your convenience with other recent events.

http://steamshovel2002.blogspot.com/2014/06/preemptory-blue-ribbon-national.html

“Preemptory Blue Ribbon National Commission on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission?

“Think, if they threw a blue ribbon commission at the anomalies in the off shore oil well industry before Deepwater, or Fukushima? Say the president throws five presidential blue ribbon commissions at the world, what would we discovered and learn about in our greater world just by mistake, with only one blue ribbon commission really being productive in preventing another Deep Water Horizon type accident. Wouldn’t it be worth our waste of treasure? You are dam lucky I am not president.”

This below is e-mail I sent to president Obama.

Dear President Obama,

This is about the dysfunction in the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and my worry about the nuclear industry. I have actually spent countless hours talking with NRC inspectors and their bosses. I got many documents submitted on the NRC Adams wed site and have been involved in many NRC internal processes (10 CFR 20: 2.206). I have been watching and monitoring these guys for decades. Years ago I was a worked at nuclear plant and was a licensed operator. I was in Navy between 1974 and 1980...I served on the experimental fast attack nuclear submarine the USS Lipscomb SSN 685.

I am nether pro or antinuke...I am a transparency nut. All I want to see is honesty and truth. I need no confidentiality or anonymity of any kind.

I know two NRC commissioner might be stepping down in the next few months...got a huge issue with commissioners Apostolakis.

We need a reset with the NRC. I am asking for a preemptory presidential blue ribbon national Commission on the NRC. I got a lot of recent industry issues written up on my blog...we are in serious trouble.

Call me anytime?

Sincerely,
 

Mike Mulligan
Hinsdale, HN
16033368320

National Commission On the Role of Nuclear Power in the United State

Report to the President

National Commission on the Adequacy of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Future of the Nuclear Power Industry

Then-candidate Barack Obama said in 2007 that the five-member NRC had become "captive of the industries that it regulates" and Joe Biden indicated he had absolutely no confidence in the agency

 

What the hell happened to these guys: Joe Biden in the Keene Sentinel in 2007 just a few miles from my home?

“What kind of confidence do you have on the regulatory capacity of the NRC (Keene Sentinel reporter)? “NONE NONE (candidate Biden).”

“I have been the biggest nemesis when I was on there for the NRC”

“It’s like getting homed, ah, coming into a small town playing at basketball championship with the local referees.” 

“On that NRC, there would be watch dogs, not house dogs. There would watch dogs.”

“I would restaff the NRC differently. “

“I would reconstitute the NRC.”

“If they were fundamentally reconstituting the plant”  

Your choice, you can have the presidential report before the debilitating accident or after the accident?

The DeepWater Horizon Presidentual commission.

National Commission On the Role of Nuclear Power in the United States

Report to the President

National Commission on the Adequacy of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Future of the Nuclear Power Industry.

Here is my pitch to President Obama on throwing a full scale “Presidential Blue Ribbon Commission” (like Challenger, Columbia and Deepwater Horizon) on the NRC and nuclear industry. From soup to nuts:
(If he only had the guts)

Dear President Obama,

“OK, this link is just for general interest, or is it? Check out for yourself if this shutdown is on the internet anywhere. The NRC PR guy was the only one allowed to talk to me…this wasn’t how I discovered it. She talked about a sump leak rate who took them out. They wouldn’t tell me what the leak rate was and the limits. I utterly hate talking to these PR guys, but I’ve learned to put an artificial polite face on it now and a smile! You made me just like the rest you 

Secret Cooper Nuclear Related related shutdown

I am the designated crazy guy with poor communication skills in this, I mean no harm.

I think a presidential code of ethics is a great idea for people in and around the NRC….a Obama edict. If you got Obama’s ears, why don’t you throw in a presidential blue ribbon commission on the nuclear industry and especially the NRC?

Mark my idiot words; we are going to be dealing with this in the nuclear industry.

“The hazard analysis requirement stipulates the analysis must be appropriate for the complexity of the operation, and the hazards identified from the analysis must then be managed.( pg 82)”

Think, if they threw a blue ribbon commission at the anomalies in the off shore oil well industry before Deepwater, or Fukushima? Say the president throws five presidential blue ribbon commissions at the world, what would we discovered and learn about in our greater world just by mistake, with only one blue ribbon commission really being productive in preventing another Deep Water Horizon type accident. Wouldn’t it be worth our waste of treasure? You are dam lucky I am not president.

Let me paint you a crazy man’s picture in a couple of e-mails…”

Yep, the agency would be more credible if the board had anti nukes and safety activist on the board or higher. Constructive antis not obstructionist.

Ok. you got to get rid of these academic types as commissioners with no direct nuclear plant experience. These academic people are invaluable, but they have the wrong skill sets and experience base for this kind of work.

I’d separate the Nuclear Power (NPE) enterprise from everything else. I put the NPE under the executive branch…but I won’t wet my pants if I can’t get my way. You got to get this this away from the senators and congressman.

I’d put the new gov agency under a single agency head or CEO thingy. Maybe a board of director thing under the agency head. All these guys would have deep NPE roots, maybe utility Ceos, nuclear power fleet Vps and union executives overseeing their plants with direct experience. I don’t care if you load up the board with utility executive guys…but you need one union guy in there to keep everyone straight. Exactly, get senior engineers on the board with direct nuclear experience. If it is construction time, a construction industry CEO and engineer on the board.

Maybe a advisory board or department to get the government rules thing right.

I’d swear to god, I’d love a experience politician on the board or even in the agency head spot.

What is the NTSB chairwomen up to today?

I mean, if you are thinking about an industry reset? And the rebuild?

mike

Regulatory Capture

Nuclear Regulatory Commission

According to Frank N. von Hippel, despite the 1979 Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has often been too timid in ensuring that America's 104 commercial reactors are operated safely:

Nuclear power is a textbook example of the problem of "regulatory capture"—in which an industry gains control of an agency meant to regulate it. Regulatory capture can be countered only by vigorous public scrutiny and Congressional oversight, but in the 32 years since Three Mile Island, interest in nuclear regulation has declined precipitously.[

Then-candidate Barack Obama said in 2007 that the five-member NRC had become "captive of the industries that it regulates" and Joe Biden indicated he had absolutely no confidence in the agency.

The NRC has given a license to "every single reactor requesting one", according Greenpeace USA nuclear policy analyst Jim Riccio to refer to the agency approval process as a "rubber stamp".[55] In Vermont, ten days after the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami that damaged Japan's Daiichi plant in Fukushima, the NRC approved a 20-year extension for the license of Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant, although the Vermont state legislature had voted overwhelmingly to deny such an extension.[55][56] The Vermont plant uses the same GE Mark 1 reactor design as the Fukushima Daiichi plant.[55] The plant had been found to be leaking radioactive materials through a network of underground pipes, which Entergy, the company running the plant, had denied under oath even existed. Representative Tony Klein, who chaired the Vermont House Natural Resources and Energy Committee, said that when he asked the NRC about the pipes at a hearing in 2009, the NRC didn't know about their existence, much less that they were leaking.[55] On March 17, 2011, the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) released a study critical of the NRC's 2010 performance as a regulator. The UCS said that through the years, it had found the NRC's enforcement of safety rules has not been "timely, consistent, or effective" and it cited 14 "near-misses" at U.S. plants in 2010 alone.[57] Tyson Slocum, an energy expert at Public Citizen said the nuclear industry has "embedded itself in the political establishment" through "reliable friends from George Bush to Barack Obama", that the government "has really just become cheerleaders for the industry."

There have also been instances of a revolving door. Jeffrey Merrifield, who was on the NRC from 1997 to 2008 and was appointed by presidents Clinton and Bush, left the NRC to take an executive position at The Shaw Group,[55] which has a nuclear division regulated by the NRC.

A year-long Associated Press (AP) investigation showed that the NRC, working with the industry, has relaxed regulations so that aging reactors can remain in operation.[59] The AP found that wear and tear of plants, such as clogged lines, cracked parts, leaky seals, rust and other deterioration resulted in 26 alerts about emerging safety problems and may have been a factor in 113 of the 226 alerts issued by the NRC between 2005 and June 2011.[59] The NRC repeatedly granted the industry permission to delay repairs and problems often grew worse before they were fixed.

Bottom line, why I do this. If the big accident comes, I am betting on it, I going to be able say I did 1000 times  more stuff than any ordinary person. I am still go to terrible regret or be guilty I didn’t do enough to stop it though.