Heard in committee in Parliament, the officials of the Federal Agency for Nuclear Control (AFCN) returned briefly to questions from deputies Cogolati (Ecolo) and Thibaut (PS) on the incident which caused the shutdown of the reactor of Tihange 3 for two weeks: “There was a sensor problem that detected a supposed anomaly in one of our pipes, but it turned out to be electromagnetic interference, no more, no less.”
waves emitted by mobile phones
In response, MP Cogolati read out a more specific response that has been circulating among plant staff: “the waves emitted by mobile phones generate disturbances which probably triggered the shutdown of Tihange 3” and the reactor operator to ask his staff to no longer use mobile phones within range of the reactor.
Quite irritated that the officials of the FANC did not provide the useful details when it is their role, the deputy Cogolati invited them to verify that it was indeed a human error of this type which caused the stop of the reactor for two weeks! In order to discuss it later during a planned passage in committee.