Utility: Neb. nuke plant would be safe in flood

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The Nebraska utility that owns Fort Calhoun nuclear power plant says the public shouldn't worry about the unlikely event of a dam failing upstream.

Omaha Public Power District spokesman Jeff Hanson says the utility conducted an extensive analysis of flood threats at Fort Calhoun.

Hanson says OPPD developed a strategy that would protect the public if the Oahe dam failed on the Missouri River. Hanson says the nuclear fuel would be protected.

OPPD is in the midst of reanalyzing flood threats as part of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's larger review of unlikely safety threats in the wake Japan's nuclear crisis last year after an earthquake and tsunami.

OPPD must report back to the NRC on its analysis of those unlikely threats by 2014.

___

Follow Josh Funk online at www.twitter.com/funkwrite