“A routine training exercise” is being blamed for a troubling emergency alert being erroneously sent out Sunday morning by the Pickering Nuclear Generating Station, east of Toronto.
And the province is promising “a full investigation” about why it happened and has apologized for the incident.
The original alert, which went out to cellphones at 7:30 a.m., warned people within 10 kilometres of the facility, which has been operating since 1971, of an unspecified incident.
- The original alert sent to people’s cellphones claimed no abnormal release of radioactivity.
- Ontario Power Generation tweeted approximately 40 minutes later the alert was a mistake.
- Two hours later, a follow-up alert was sent to people’s cellphones.
“There is NO active nuclear situation taking place at the Pickering Nuclear Generating Station,” the follow-up alert said.
“The previous alert was issued in error. There is no danger to the public or environment. No further action is required.”
“The Government of Ontario sincerely apologizes for raising public concern and has begun a full investigation to determine how this error happened and will take the appropriate steps to ensure this doesn’t happen again.”
Article submitted by, Avro Arrow.