Sci-Fi Plot Bunny: Jellyfish Shut Down Reactor

[3113]

Wacky but true! From here:

Strange, jellyfish-like creatures swarming a coastal nuclear power plant: It might sound like the premise of a cult horror flick, but the invasion has prompted officials at the Diablo Canyon facility in San Luis Obispo, Calif., to curtail operations for at least a few days.

The plant's operator, Pacific Gas & Electric, cut power generation from one of the plant's two reactors to 25 percent of its capacity, spokesman Tom Cuddy said Wednesday. The other reactor was shut down this week for what PG&E described as routine refueling and maintenance, a procedure that could take about a month.

Workers on Monday discovered an influx of the creatures, called salp, clogging screens that are used to keep marine life out of the sea water used as a coolant, Cuddy said. Often thronging many square miles of ocean in huge, gelatinous masses, salp are tubular, transparent organisms that can be roughly the size of a human thumb. No one knows how many are at the Avila Beach plant or how long they will remain.

And apparently this is not the first reactor shut down by jellyfish! Wonder what attracts them....

 

[Stella_Omega]

Wacky but true! From here:

And apparently this is not the first reactor shut down by jellyfish! Wonder what attracts them....

I think this is my favorite new post of the day. Salp are natures way of telling you your yacht isn't going anywhere.

 

[Tio_Narratore]

Wacky but true! From here:

And apparently this is not the first reactor shut down by jellyfish! Wonder what attracts them....

The power plants take in water for cooling the reactor, and pump the heated water back out. The salps, like many organisms, may be following the temperature gradient towards the nuclear plant. Alternatively, the intake pump may be creating a subtle current, but one strong enough to draw the jellyfish. Why don't we apply for a grant to study the phenomenon?

 

[Zeb_Carter]

It their plot to take over the lakes and oceans of the world.

 

[Handley_Page]

Salp of the Oceans, Unite.​

 

[Tio_Narratore]

Salp of the Oceans, Unite.​

You have nothing to lose
but the drains!​

 

[HeatherVivant]

A young, mild-mannered nuclear engineer working the third shift invites his girlfriend out to the plant for a 3AM lunchtime interlude in the waters just outside the intake. As they find their groove in the warm ocean waters, suddenly, from nowhere, comes the torturing sting of the jellyfish.

The night is ruined! Love is lost!

Or is it?

His girlfriend finds the stings...shall we say...stimulating. She comes again and again that fateful night, and the exquisite agony brings her back to the plant night after night until she can barely walk. Yet the passion drives her to return.

And we shall call it: Fifty Shades of Jelly.

 

[JackLuis]

A young, mild-mannered nuclear engineer working the third shift invites his girlfriend out to the plant for a 3AM lunchtime interlude in the waters just outside the intake. As they find their groove in the warm ocean waters, suddenly, from nowhere, comes the torturing sting of the jellyfish.

The night is ruined! Love is lost!

Or is it?

His girlfriend finds the stings...shall we say...stimulating. She comes again and again that fateful night, and the exquisite agony brings her back to the plant night after night until she can barely walk. Yet the passion drives her to return.

And we shall call it: Fifty Shades of Jelly.

I'd read it.

 

[3113]

His girlfriend finds the stings...shall we say...stimulating. She comes again and again that fateful night, and the exquisite agony brings her back to the plant night after night until she can barely walk. Yet the passion drives her to return.

And we shall call it: Fifty Shades of Jelly.

I think you're got a winner on your hands. But the twist has to be that the jellyfish are radioactive thanks to the reactor and transforming the girlfriend into some kind of superhero (?). That way there can be sequels.