Nuclear station components may slow traffic from Rock Hill for three days. Here’s why
Traffic could be a little slower between Rock Hill and Lake Wylie on Saturday, then again next week, due to nuclear plant components on the move.
Three 184-ton, low-pressure turbines at the Norfolk Southern rail yard in Rock Hill are ready to be moved to the Catawba Nuclear Station. The first one hauls out Saturday. Two more rotors make the trip Jan. 6 and Jan. 8.
“During these heavy equipment moves, traffic might be impacted,” said Sara Collins, spokesperson for Catawba Nuclear parent company Duke Energy.
The roughly 20-mile route will take six to eight hours depending on weather and other conditions. Edwards Moving & Rigging will move the equipment by truck and trailer. South Carolina Highway Patrol will escort, with travel at 20 to 30 mph.
“The moves are scheduled from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. each day,” Collins said.
The trailer loads are 154 feet long, 15 feet wide and more than 16 feet high weighing about 297 tons each. The turbines traveled from by rail from Schenectady, N.Y., to Albany, N.Y., before taking a barge to the port in Charleston. They moved by train from Charleston to Rock Hill.
An exact route for the move wasn’t given. Much of any main route between Rock Hill and the Lake Wylie nuclear plant, whether east of the lake via I-77 and back west on S.C. 49 or the more direct route using S.C. 274 to the west, involves roads with at least two lanes of travel in each direction.
Closer to the station, lanes narrow to one each way on Concord Road which serves as the only way in or out on the peninsula where the station operates.
This story was originally published January 3, 2020 at 10:21 AM.
