SCUBA DIVER SUCKED INTO NUCLEAR PLANT INTAKE PIPE

Christopher Le Cun did not know he was scuba diving near an intake pipe for the St. Lucie Nuclear Power Plant in Florida. The pipe pulls in around 500,000 gallons of ocean water per minute. Le Cun was drawn into the current. He says he spent four or five minutes tumbling through the darkness of the pipe, which Florida Power & Light Co. says is 16 feet in diameter and a quarter-mile long. He thought about his wife and kids, back on the boat. Then, he says, he saw a tiny light in the distance, “almost like somebody lit a match, then all the sudden it was on me. It spit me out into the sunlight into this canal and there were tons of fish around. Goliath groupers, tarpons.” He was in a pond at the nuclear plant. “I saw a worker there and he asks, ‘How did you get in here?’ He says, ‘You’re really lucky, we were getting ready to leave for the night in five minutes.'” Le Cun has filed a lawsuit against Florida Power & Light over the experience, which happened last July 12. He says the intake pipe was not marked and posed a danger to him. The power company disagrees, saying there are signs and a protective cap to deter objects from being drawn into the tube.
* Ooo, the nuclear intake has a protective cap! Every thing’s all right then.
* The protective cap “deters objects” from entering? Like, tries to talk them out of it?
* Make that: There USED to be a protective cap.
* On the bright side, the giant spinning blades had been removed for cleaning.
* Sounds like the power company’s case is going down the tubes.
* I’d imagine that’s what being born a fish is like.
* Well, in any case, that’s the origin story of how Aqua Man came to be.
* He was in a pond at a nuclear plant? That’s the good news?
* It was really amazing in the pond, especially seeing the glowing manatee.
* Was there a three-eyed mutant fish, like on the Simpsons?
* I hate to think of who might be hearing this story and coming up with a plan.
* Good luck suing a nuclear power plant. Haven’t you heard how that goes?