b' After SL-1it turned into a totally new way of doing business with reactors. Procedural documents that originally had been two pages long were 1961 expanded into thick books, and all activitybecame\x07rigidly\x07prescribed.\x07\x07Joe\x07Henscheid,\x07 ETR Critical Facility supervisorStationary Low-Power ReactorThe darkest hour in the history of NRTS was the January 1961 accident at the Argonne-designed Stationary Low-Power Reactor No. 1, which killed three men. SL-1 was the firstof several prototype reactors designed for the U.S. Army to develop a low-power, boiling water reactor plant to be used in geographically remote locations. It came online Aug. 11, 1958. On Jan. 3, 1961, a night crew arrived to complete maintenance and startup activities after the Christmas break. Investigators concluded that the accident happened after one of them manually withdrew the central control rod, which had a history of sticking, in an attempt to reconnect it to its drive mechanism. The AEC immediately surveyed the nations 47 licensed reactors to assure shutdown procedures and operating parameters fell withinsafe specifications.29'