Nuclear plant on alert as two incidents told

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Nuclear plant on alert as two incidents told By: Staff October 25, 2001 RED WING-Federal authorities have been notified of two incidents outside the Prairie Island Nuclear Plant near Red Wing as the plant is still on highest alert in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the East Coast. Red Wing police said the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has looked into at least one of the incidents, according to an article in last Friday's Red Wing Republican Eagle. On Oct. 7, a neighbor and a hunter reported seeing nine men of Middle Eastern descent walking around and talking on cell phones close to a remote overlook of the plant. Red Wing Deputy Public Safety Director Tim Sletten was quoted as saying the men were gone by the time authorities arrived, but an FBI agent from Rochester, Minn., checked out the site last Wednesday, as did Sletten.

On Oct. 13, 10 people of either Mideast or India descent were said to have been stopped for trespassing on Xcel Energy Company property. The group, in two cars, were apparently looking at fall colors. Sletten reportedly said the group was cooperative, allowing authorities to search their vehicles; a background check of them by the FBI showed nothing suspicious, area authorities indicated.

Other threats received pertaining to the plant have also been deemed not suspicious, Sletten reportedly said.

Meantime, plant officials reportedly said security at the site remains at the highest level following a purported threat on Pennsylvania's Three Mile Island nuclear reactor Wednesday. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission was said to have announced the next day that the threat at that plant, which leaked radiation in 1979, wasn't credible.

http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=2540025&BRD=1263&PAG=461&dept_id=159935&rfi=6

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), October 26, 2001


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