Exploring an Abandoned Nuclear Power Plant 

Here's what we're looking at. You're exploring a General Electric type 5 Boiling Water Reactor inside a Mark II containment. The plant would have put out 820 megawatts to the grid. 2:00 - dispense with the radiation monitor... the plant has been thoroughly decontaminated and you're going to be picking up normal naturally occurring background radiation. 0.05 microSieverts/hr is below naturally occurring background radiation. The construction of the plant provides shielding against that, ergo the lower readings inside. 3:45 - hoistwell for the turbine building going down to the truck bay 4:00 - turbine deck... exciter has been removed, the generator stator (with the round wood cover) and high and low pressure turbines remain. 4:15 - that's the generator, which is driven by the turbines spinning at 1,800 RPM producing 820 megawatts of power. Typically it's output is around 24,000 volts of 3-phase AC which is stepped up to a higher voltage - either 115, 230 or 345 kv depending on Long Island's transmission system. The small platform in front of the generator is where the exciter was. The exciter generated the magnetic field for the generator. 4:30 - that long thing under the tarp is the generator rotor - the part that spins inside the stator 5:45 - GaiTronics party line / paging system. The Hear-Here booth provides some sound isolation so you can hear the other party. It gets very noisy when the plant is running. 9:15 - pressure differential - you're entering an air lock to the reactor building. There's a negative pressure in there to keep any contaminants contained within that building. 9:45 - you are now in what's known as the secondary containment. The 'cylindrical' thing is the reactor's primary containment. The grated floors are removable for hoisting equipment between elevations. 12:15 - main hoistwell to the refueling floor 15:25 - RWCU = Reactor Water Clean Up pump suction temperature gauge - as you can see it goes up to 600 degrees F... it gets pretty hot when it's operating. 16:15 - stairs are tiring... yup - the wonders of a reactor building get old when the elevator is out of service... factor in elevated temperatures when the plant is at 100% power. 17:30 - refueling floor and polar crane 17:50 - you're looking down in to the reactor cavity. The netting is covering the drywell. The actual reactor itself is long gone. 18:05 - laydown pit - during refueling, it's filled with water providing a place for some of the reactor internals for temporary storage. Typically the steam dryer and moisture separator gets placed here. 18:25 - radiation monitors that you walk through - not metal detectors 19:30 - spent fuel pool - where fuel is stored to cool down after spending 6 years in the reactor under 40 feet of water. New fuel is placed in there for refueling. The new fuel itself is safe to handle, but for the ease of handling and expediency during refueling, it's placed in the SFP prior to the refueling outage. 20:45 - personnel air lock - passageway between secondary and primary containment (the drywell). The drywell is kept pressurized with nitrogen. 23:00 - equipment hatch 24:05 - you're standing on top of the suppression pool. No fuel rods there - that's what the spent fuel pool is for... just lots of equipment - pumps, pipes, etc... HP = human physics (or radiation protection). 24:55 - you're in the undervessel of the reactor. That's where the hydraulic control rod drives were all located. 27:35 - if caught you'd likely be arrested for criminal trespass 28:00 - truck bay extension - basically a big air lock for bringing in things like fuel assemblies, equipment, etc... unsure what the tanks are for 30:20 - heat exchangers or feedwater heaters 34:00 - chemistry lab 35:50 - some kind of high pressure steam line and isolation valve 36:50 - main switchgear / power boards feeding other plant systems 39:30 - main control room 40:40 - control rod position controls 42:30 - reactor operators train for about 2 years before they're licensed - every extensive, and they're constantly retraining, recertifying, etc. Needless to say they're paid very well. 44:00 - Plus signs on the ground everywhere is where radiological testing was done to certify that area was free of radiactivity as part of the decontamination process (you see them on the walls as well). The plus signs you see there represent a control rod - really a plus sign shaped blade made of neutron absorbing material to control the reaction. 44:15 - a control room is typically staffed with a shift manager, control room supervisor, a couple of reactor operators and a technical advisor. 44:55 - an old hard drive disk pack

Seems to be a lot of confusion here on what is probably one of the most thorough "tours" of a Boiling Water Reactor you'll find on RU-vid. They don't technically make it into the Reactor Core, as there isn't one. From the top level or Reactor Hall in this case they look down into a massive circular pit which would have housed the Reactor Vessel (which contains the fuel rod assembly/reactor core) before it was decommissioned and removed. The rectangular pit adjacent to this would have been for fuel rod storage. Had they climbed down below the safety netting they would have ended up on top of the plate they refer to as the "aliens nest". The room they entered below that (with the cutaway opening) is where the control rod jacks are housed. This inner chamber is inside a massive upside down concrete light bulb called the Dry Well (accessed through the heavy doors and airlock). The many ominous holes in the floor (with triangular plates on top) have nothing to do with storing fuel rods but rather lead to the slightly more complex labyrinth of tunnels called the Wet Well. Have the lights been left on for decades? Almost certainly. Does that mean its still generating power? No, generally the auxiliary power to run one of these stations comes from diesel generators on site and in this case, we know there's a station next door. It would be a death trap to both intruder and security guards alike without lighting. Its highly likely that some of the halls are still used for storage anyway. Could they encounter radiation here? Unlikely, the clean up process is insanely thorough and this is a baby reactor in the scheme of things. At best, the biggest reading would be from discarded PPE and left over lab samples, I would be more worried about falling/drowning. Had the plant still contained fission materials they would have more likely found themselves shot (in the UK too). What was the long missile shaped object wrapped in a protective cover? That's a rotor, slots inside the stator (large drum with the plywood end cap) but left as one unit it would surely corrode in place. The turbines in this plant are directly driven by the steam from the reactor vessel and thus will have been highly contaminated and removed early on in the decommissioning. Why is there "abandoned" - abandoned equipment everywhere? There will have been thousands of contractors and sub contractors working here throughout a period of bureaucratic frenzy, especially if the electricity company has government funding to burn. Three separate contractors will be commissioned, to fabricate the same safety rail whilst two other firms will be simultaneously removing it and none of them know who is using which ladder and whether or not they've finished with it.... Hope this clears up any misconceptions - Power Station Anorak/Welder

Thanks for the walk down memory lane. I walked all those stairs hundreds of times in the 6 years I worked there...and yes, everyone in ops knew what everything did. It has been so stripped down, but enough left for you grasp the big picture. Nice tour, guys!

Ironically, this might be one of the safest abandoned buildings I've seen you guys enter.

I respect your self control to not push any buttons...

25 yrs since it's operated bit the lights are still on....huh, my wife and kids must've been there last. Every day I come home from work and every single light in the house is on

Crazy thing about this particular facility is that it was never actually operated for more than just tests and was decommissioned shortly after being completed due to local opposition after the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl meltdowns.

Watching this almost 8 years later- Man what a place to explore. I can’t imagine what it would be like to walk around such a complex masterpiece.

What's ironic is the building was made to create power. But now does nothing but consume it.

All those physical buttons, switches, dials, gauges, cables and mysterious magnetic data storage media... obviously the lights are still on because nobody could find the light switch.

I'm way late to the party, but simply amazing. As I have commented elsewhere, how surreal is it that the people who built, maintained and operated that facility one day after a predetermined shutdown procedure, left and never came back. Weird how some areas look intact, some ransacked, others just left as they were on that last day. It's so intriguing to wonder when the last time someone lay hands on a phone, made a control adjustment, or made a repair, for the last time and didn't know it. Then ALL of that steel, concrete and various materials will most likely be left behind to slowly decay. It must have taken an immense amount of effort to design and build such a facility, only to have it abandoned. Great video, thanks for sharing.

I worked in a nuclear plant close to 30 years ago. This was like a trip through time. Thank you.

Dude you are what exploring channels should be! No dramatic bs and no clickbait.

You better whisper so the radiation doesnt wake up

Loved the control room, reminded me of plants I ran 30 years ago. You learn the plants by tracing lines and drawing them from memory on a board. You learn the SCADA and Control systems from Operation Handbooks and PNID drawings.

I am facing my megalophobia watching this. You guys are brave to be here.

I like how y'all were worried about walking near the pedestrian 480V temporary line, but then stroll right by the humming cabinets fed from the 69,000 V line hah.

Am I the only person who loves that constant 480 volt Transformer Humm throughout the video?

I couldn't even imagine the amount of labor hours it takes to construct a power plant like this.

The HOT on the control panels behind the nets meant that there is electricity flowing through it. The net was likely put up when the plant was closed for safety. That was crazy high power as you could hear. The funny thing about the computers in the control room is that if they were from the 1980s then given their size they probably each had about the same computing power as a 90s desktop. Computers up until the 80s were still very large. The thing labeled CDC might have been an old removable multi platter storage drive.

Most abandoned places have a creepy feel to them but those lights made the power plant oddly welcoming.

That place looks insanely complicated. I can't imagine how long it would take to design and build (and debug) something like this.

40:10 “Let’s fire this bad boy up!” 😂

Hi Guys, the computer discs at 44:55 are called Winchester discs. I used to use a Quantel PaintBox in 1984 and it had a stack of about 6 or 8 discs of about 15" diameter and hardwired into the computer with no external cover. The computer was the size of a standard domestic refrigerator enclosed in a glass cabinet. When writing to disc it was noisy. PaintBox was pre-Photoshop and cost about a million dollars for a basic unit. We can buy the same now for about 1 or 2 thousand dollars and is a laptop with Photoshop. Love the vids, keep up the good work and stay safe.

Reactor is/was a General Electric BWR design. The Turbine-Generator is/was a 820 MW General Electric. First thing under the black tarp was the 4 pole generator field which rotates at 1800 RPM for 60 hertz power output . In areas with 50 hertz power, nuclear units turn at 1500 RPM. Fossil units turn at twice that speed and are 2 pole (3600 & 3000). The field uses DC current to produce a rotating magnetic field inside the stationary generator core (stator) which then produces 3 phase AC power (820MW) at maybe 24 to 30,000 volts. The generator core and field are cooled by running in pure hydrogen gas at about 60 psig. The high voltage stator windings are cooled by pure deionized water circulating through the copper conductors themselves. The high purity of the water makes the water an insulator. By the way, the low pressure turbine rotors ot this unit were removed and used on another nuclear turbine. This plant was never allowed (licensed) to produce more than 5% rated power before it was decommissioned. 820 MW is a little over 1 million horsepower. I was an GE engineer who specialized in working on these large machines (nuclear and fossil fired) although I never worked on this one. Largest one I ever worked on was the two million horsepower units (3) at Palo Verde Station outside Phoenix, AZ. They were the largest in the world at that time I think, maybe not now but still close to largest i"m sure.

I worked on plants for about a decade, have a couple things to point out. The turbine area is referred to as the "turbine deck". The end that had plywood over it used to connect with a shaft to the generator, which is missing, though the mounting blocks are apparent. Since this is an old reactor, and most likely retired (though that's an assumption, I haven't watched the whole video yet), this facility is probably a BWR or boiling water reactor. That is the older type of reactor setup, which uses a single loop between the reactor and the turbine, with no heat exchanger or second loop. This is not a definite, again since I just started watching this, though it's good to know of BWRs anyway. Some are still in operation, I believe. The second type, as you mentioned in the video is a PWR, or Pressurized Water Reactor, which uses two loops and a heat exchanger. Your description of the process was a little faulty, I have to mention. The fuel rods heat reactor water, creating steam. The steam pressure provides the force to move through the system and drive the turbine (whether PWR or BWR). As the steam cools late in the cycle it is condensed and returned to the reactor by means of the cooling towers that are often so prominent. If I have more comments, I'll chime in again.

10:23 that beep scared tf out of me

Nearly 6 years too late to this video, but this is genuinely the best urbex video I've watched. Incredible. Well done boys!

FYI the "metal detector" with the big transformer isn't a metal detector. It's actually a radiation detector that makes sure workers are clean before leaving the reactor and possibly contaminating the entire facility.

You know, after watching HBO's Chernobyl, I am something of a nuclear physicist myself.

That control room was insane. You guys are lucky to have been able to find that.

Me and my wife watched this one together, I streamed it to my T.V. off my laptop. One of the best walk through's I've ever seen.

Smithers, theres a pair of blundering oafs desecrating my beloved abandoned plant!......*scowls*.....release the hounds!

Me: why are we whispering You: it's scarier Me: oh

These videos are special. Just imagining the history behind what now lies abandoned induces an emotion i find hard to put into words.

I love the whispering - common reaction when in awe of huge structures (and of course, unsure at times if anyone is around!) I also like your tones and actions showing respect in top explorer tradition.

I would recommend that you take an atmospheric measuring device with you when you are traveling in unknown buildings and especially in lower-lying rooms. There are odorless gases that can be extremely dangerous for you. Before you can detect any lack of oxygen by yourself, it could be too late.

“There’s so much to see here” *zooms in on a broken light*

my all time fave sub-exploration vid, watched it a few times over the last couple of years (and again now) and it's *still* awesome!

it would be nice to have expert tour guides telling and showing these guys and us what everything actually is and what it does.

I got to say that electrical buzz noise instantly scares the shit out of me .

Should've used the geiger counter on the 40--yr-old thing in that fridge.

Bloody amazing. You just look at all the levels, pipes, fittings, cranes, chambers etc. etc and wonder at the planning and engineering that went into it. I had to chuckle when you came across the old CDC (Control Data Corporation) hard disk pack. Yep, old drives were the size of washing machines in those days. I was also amused at you reaction to hearing the energized transformers humming in the power supply room.

Great video guys! It's also cool to see so many comments from people who have worked in similar plants sharing their knowledge.

The "metal detectors" are radiation detectors. You scan workers as they enter and leave to see if they are contaminated. There's a fun story of a nuclear plant worker who used to set the detectors off every morning as he came IN to work. They thought he must be stealing radioactive stuff and sneaking it out somehow then contaminating himself at home. Turned out he had really high natural radon gas levels in his house.

You guys were pretty close on most of your educated guesses on what was what. You were actually standing where the fuel rods once were when you found that abandoned scaffold. The area joining the reactor core is called the spent fuel pool. This is where they staged the new rods and storage for used rods. When moving rods, they must remain under water to prevent contamination from going airborne and it helps reduce gamma radiation as well. The walls you noted as being very thick are a special concrete that contains lead to absorb gamma radiation. Source- I worked in a nuclear power plant for approx 4 years.

This place is HUGE...Wow. I love yalls vids. Keeps me intrigued.

i’ve been binge watching your videos for hours since i found your channel, so far this is my favorite and most interesting one!

Just the fact that you walked into the plant WITH NO PROBLEMS means that no matter what would you do in that control room, nothing catastrophic would happen. Otherwise the owner would know about you the second you entered the power plant. (my opinion)

Screw everything. Imagine being the architect who had to draw all of this up and make sure every pipe fitting was in the right place. Every wire there was ran to the right place... all of that crap. That has got to be the most intense drafting job on the planet.

As a former GE guy, this stuff is like an entire generation and leap of technology backward from today (Obviously) its just really cool to see this stuff. Usually when I get to it, something bad happened.

You guys are AWESOME!! Absolutely mind boggling exploration!

I absolutely LOVED this one. Looks like Aperture Science

A lot of the electronics were what my company manufactured and I tested and repaired it. The GE MAC7000 line was bought out by Bailey controls Co. I worked there 1975-1995. The Keyboard was an Intecolor which was a data terminal that connected to more modern digital controllers in the Network 90 system. All those racks in the hall with gray faced modules with red test points, were simple analog units. Those big things that had "CDC" on them were changable hard drives. They were probably 2-10 Megabyte drives. By today's standard, would only store a couple pictures from a digital camera.

I did my internship in the biggest nuclear powerplant of my country. I'll never forget how amazing it all was for the whole 3 months I've been there. Amazing people as well. 40:00 thing is, this is still true for the stuff today. They go hardcore with the saying "If it ain't broke, don't fix it".

Awesome video, thank you for sharing every inch of the building. When you explore a place like this are your hearts racing the whole time?

Wow, that was insane! Just imagine the amount of engineering that went into building this!

This must have been the Motel 6 of nuclear reactors...they left the light on for you. ;)

Amazing that you just were able to walk into this place. You would have thought security guards would be around. Those consoles in the main control room remind me of the movie "The China Syndrome.

That was SO COOL to see!!! Thank you for sharing, Wow!!

People commenting on the lights: Most abandoned places... Especially those that produced eletricity or mechanics left the lights on, even though these buildings are abandoned, there will still be security patroling the building every so often to make sure everything in the building is okay and there aren't any trespassers or people who thought it would make a great shelter. As abandoned buildings are prime locations for illegal events. it also helps prevent animals entering the building that could do damage or even harm themselves, Hence why they found tracks in the darkest place.

The Proper People: "Sponsored by Pepsi. JK we don't have any sponsors. Watching in 2019: "Patience. You will. You will..."

It’s insane that the lights still work in this power plant that hasn’t been active in 25 years. Even more insane is that everything is intact, and there isn’t any sign of spray paint ANYWHERE.

One of my favorite videos from you guys. This is the one that got me hooked.

Man who knew so many people were nuclear engineers on RU-vid lol

For those wondering why it still has power, it's because they can't just abandon something like this, the government regulations don't allow it. So they have to keep the sump pumps working and the smoke alarms working, and probably have to inspect it and test for radiation periodically, so the lights stay on. And basically, it's cheaper to keep a minimal level of maintenance, and pay the power bill forever, than it is to fully tear it down.

Thanks guys! That was one of the coolest fucking videos on the internet! I watched it 3 times and sent to to most of my friends. Not only did I watch it three times but I read every single comment and was completely fascinated

This was the coolest video I have watched on abandoned sites.Thank you for the extensive tavel through! Were you scared at any point?

why is the power still on if its been abandoned for 20 years

44:36 - 45:17 The CDC Model 877 hard disks you see here (the entire case is one disk, with five platters stacked on top of each other) stored 80 megabytes of data each.

Wow... I think this is the most incredible abandoned find. You all are so lucky

Nice vid guys! Having worked at a nuclear power plant it is a complete different world once you get inside. Unfathomable amounts of money go into building and maintaining these facilities. And look what happened to this one...

FANTASTIC!!!

"Oh, I had the Geiger counter set to the wrong decimal point. I don't feel so good."

@The Proper Peoples Ik hoop echt op meerdere van deze powerplants!! zo gaaf om te bekijken. Deze video was de mooist complete erover. Heb de anderen ook gezien die veel kleiner waren enz. maar die vond ik minder spannend maar ook wel heel mooi!! Love you guys!!!

Rewatching this now that I’m in school to me an industrial electrical maintenance tech. So interesting, cheers after 5 years!

i can’t tell you how many times i’ve watched this video fully. one of my favorite videos on the internet.

if this reactor has been inactive for years, it's been probably abandoned a while back too, so why are the lights still on? How is this place still supplied in electricity?

That opening with the blinking lights always brings me into the right mood for this episode. Very well done

Most interesting to me is how little dust there is after 25 years. I guess it's sealed up pretty tight? Thanks for exploring! 🤩

"this must be a REALLY old metal detector..." *gestures to a wooden frame* 18:19

Cool video, i was expecting to be on a click bait video where they go explore something they have no idea about, but the part of the reactor where you go through an air lock essentially would have been to allow the inside of the reactor shell to stay at a lower than atmospheric pressure so if there are any leaks all it will do is suck air in and not let any contamination escape.

You guys are my original urbex explorers, fantastic explore & good to see you're still looking at some cool places 😮

Amazing place and video! Thanks for sharing it!!!

The last thing i want to hear in a nuclear power plant is: "Oops"

in soviet russia, power plant explore you.

All the lights shut off..... the intercom crackles... and a creepy voice says.... "I've been waiting for players.... welcome to my little game of hide and seek"

This was an awesome video,, I enjoyed every second of it,, great job guys!

Man...I love the aesthetic of power plants. Justthat cold, brutal, industrial, calculated design mmmm... o__O

43:14 Halley's comet? It passed by in 1986, maybe they were astronomy fans in the control room?

The amount of instrumentation in the control Room is amazing they had some expensive Foxboro controls their

The whole place is buzzing and lit from within. That is precisely what makes it so scary! So, is there anyone else in here?

FYI, the "Tape Things" you found, near the end? They were the platters for a real HDD (Look at the side view and you will see the platters stacked) You took the entire thing and inserted it in the HDD tower (size of a small washing machine) There's a locking mechanism that allows you to remove the blue dome, leaving the stack behind Once in the tower, the platters would spin up to speed and the HDD Read/write heads would emerge from the side All of that, probably for about 6-10MB storage [MASSIVE, back in the day]

lol the diagram of the solar system says "not to scale"

My uncle was a foreman at a nuclear plant here in Ontario(Canada) and I wish I had asked him more questions before he passed because who knew I’d be so fascinated by this

love this stuff great going guys thanks for the tour.

Those aren't metal detectors, they count the radioactive particles on you. You would have to walk through one before you could leave the area to make sure you didnt have any contamination. They're a pain sometimes, I work at a nuclear plant and they're very sensitive. Most workers dont know how every part of the plant works. You get a work package with very detailed step by step instructions and other shit to follow. Basically someone with very little experience can do a lot of the work there. A lot of the shit is repetitive even though it looks different, it just operates back ups for backup of stuff in case of emergency failers. Funny thing is, most of the stuff you guys saw is still being used today in nuclear plants. That control room is the same as current running plants.

This was the coolest video i've ever seen! Btw,some curiosities: The counter you were using measures the radiation in Sievert, that can also be converted to Röntgen (or Roentgen). The convertion unit is: 1 rem=0.01 sievert (Sv) Also, if you go on this reactor again, try to find the EPS-5 button (also known as the AZ-5 button) in the control room. It's a full emergency stop system. When pressed, it drops the rods into the water to cooldown the reactor. In Chernobyl, this button was pressed by Alexsander Akimov when the overheat started, but due to a failure on the reactor design, the reactions became faster and the reactor exploded. Btw, very cool video!!

So satisfying exploring this stuff

Totally geeked out over this video! Great stuff!