DUSHANBE, October 5, 2009, Asia-Plus — No serious accidents have occurred at the Norak hydroelectric power station (HPS) over the past thirty-seven years, Bahrom Sirojev, ex-head of Tajikglavenergo (Tajik main energy directorate in the Soviet time), said in an interview with Asia-Plus, commenting on a statement made by the head of Rostekhnadzor (Russia’s agency for engineering supervision) Nikolay Kutyin at a meeting with reporters in Moscow on October 3.
Speaking to reporters in Moscow, Kutyin noted on October 3 that the accident at the Sayano-Shushenskaya HPS in Russia was not a unique accident for the post-Soviet area. According to him, similar accident allegedly took place at the Norak HPS in Tajikistan in 1983.
“The information about that accident had been classified as secret and specialists had not been able to get materials on the Norak accident, and therefore, they failed to assess the situation [at the Sayano-Shushenskaya HPS] correctly,” the Rostekhnadzor head said. According to him, “the accident at the Norak HPS and the accident at the Sayano-Shushenskaya HPS were caused by disruption of units’ bindings.”
We will recall that the Sayano-Shushenskaya station on August 17, 2009 suffered a catastrophic accident that caused flooding of the engine and turbine rooms and a transformer explosion. As of 4 September 2009, 74 people were confirmed dead while one person is listed as missing.
In the meantime, Mr. Sirojev says no serious accidents have been reported at the Norak HPS over the past thirty-seven years. “The first units of the station were introduced into operation in 1972 and no serious accidents have been reported at the Norak HPS since that time,” said Sirojev. Moreover, he rules out that accident like that that occurred at the Sayano-Shushenskaya HPS may occur at the Norak HPS.
“When I was appointed to head Tajikglavenergo in 1983, the Norak HPS had not yet been put into industrial exploitation, though all its units were introduced into operation in 1979,” said Sirojev, “As chairman of the commission for formal acceptance of the Norak HPS, I had to work at least one and half years, involving 25-30 various organizations, in order to remove some 2,000 defects at the station.”
