Arkansas Nuclear 2 trips offline, unscheduled outage underway

[Core Content]

Arkansas Nuclear 2, Russellville, Arkansas.

Arkansas Nuclear 2 began an unscheduled outage, with the unit reported at 0% power in the NRC daily report of Nov 4, 2026. This event ends a streak of more than 5 years without an unscheduled outage for the unit. This is the 1 forced outage for Arkansas Nuclear 2 in 2026, compared to 0 in all of 2025.

RUSSELLVILLE, AR. Arkansas Nuclear 2 entered an unscheduled outage and was at 0% power in the NRC's Nov 4, 2026 daily power report. The NRC has not yet issued an event notification for this trip; a follow-up reply will be posted here if one is filed.

This is the first unscheduled outage of 2026 for the unit. Its most recent outage was a 48-day refueling outage that ended in April 2026. Prior to this trip, the unit had gone more than 5 years without an unscheduled outage.

Across the U.S. fleet of 94 commercial reactors, today's combined capacity factor is 80.5% (15 units currently refueling, 3 units in unscheduled outages), below the 88.0% baseline for this month over the past five years. At the same site, Arkansas Nuclear 1 is running at full power. Vogtle 2 and Cooper also experienced unscheduled outages within the past week. While the unit is down, that takes about 788,000 homes' worth of generation off the grid.

Arkansas Nuclear 2 is a 985-MW Combustion Engineering PWR operated by Entergy (commercial operation since 1980). The utility operates both units at this site and 3 more at 3 other U.S. plants. Its operating license runs through 2038 (renewed in 2005).

Heading to Russellville, AR for support work? RSCS / Allied Power holds the radiation protection staffing contract here. Current per-diem averages $113/night lodging plus $68/day meals (total $181/day), and Unemployment Benefits are $451 weekly. Arkansas taxes wages on a graduated scale, about 3.7% effective. NukeWorker lists 1 open nuclear job in Arkansas.

View Arkansas Nuclear 2's ratings, history, projections, and current status on NukeWorker. This thread will follow the restart and power ascension. Get a free email alert the moment it comes back online.

Want the full picture? Subscribe to the NukeWorker outage schedule for every current and upcoming U.S. nuclear outage.

Sources: NRC Daily Reactor Power Status reports, validated outage schedules, and NukeWorker's projections.

[Core Content]

Follow-up: the NRC has filed its event notification for the Arkansas Nuclear 2 trip first reported in this thread. The agency classifies it as an automatic reactor trip (docket 05000368).

AUTOMATIC REACTOR TRIP The following information was provided by the licensee via phone and email: "On November 3, 2026, at 0838 CST, Arkansas Nuclear One, Unit 2 experienced an automatic reactor trip from 100 percent power due to exceeding the departure from nucleate boiling ratio on reactor protection system (RPS) channels 1 and 2 due to the loss of all reactor coolant pump (RCPs). Emergency feedwater (EFW) actuated automatically due to low water level in the 'A' and 'B' steam generators. EFW responded as designed to feed both steam generators automatically. "The loss of all RCPs was caused by non-vital 6900-volt buses '2H1' and '2H2' de-energizing. This resulted in a loss of reactor coolant system forced circulation and a loss of main condenser vacuum. [...]

View Arkansas Nuclear 2's ratings, history, projections, and current status on NukeWorker.

Source: NRC event notification.