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2026 Annual Conference
May 31–June 3, 2026
Denver, CO|Sheraton Denver
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What’s the most difficult question you’ve been asked as a maintenance instructor?
Blye Widmar
"Where are the prints?!"
This was the final question in an onslaught of verbal feedback, comments, and critiques I received from my students back in 2019. I had two years of instructor experience and was teaching a class that had been meticulously rehearsed in preparation for an accreditation visit. I knew the training material well and transferred that knowledge effectively enough for all the students to pass the class. As we wrapped up, I asked the students how they felt about my first big system-level class, and they did not hold back.
“Why was the exam from memory when we don’t work from memory in the plant?” “Why didn’t we refer to the vendor documents?” “Why didn’t we practice more on the mock-up?” And so on.
B. J. Wrona, J. T. A. Roberts, T. M. Galvin, G. T. Higgins
Nuclear Technology | Volume 32 | Number 3 | March 1977 | Pages 276-289
Technical Paper | Fuel | doi.org/10.13182/NT77-A31751
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A direct-electrical-heating apparatus was utilized to perform fundamental experiments on short, unirradiated, unclad UO2 pellet stacks to investigate the effect of varying the energy-deposition rate and energy level on the mechanical response of the fuel to transient heating. Results show that as the rate of energy input to the UO2 pellet stacks increases, (a) the energy failure threshold decreases and (b) the areal melt fraction at failure decreases. Two significantly different regimes of fuel-motion behavior were observed above and below a threshold designated as the threshold of gross fuel motion. Above the threshold, this motion occurs by molten fuel release. Below the threshold, fuel deforms plastically by a creep mechanism.
