Derailment:
“Preliminarily, it looks like something caused the switch arm to be thrown,” said Cathryn Lacy, a spokesperson for Lakeland Electric.
The RICE Engines:
David Holdener, Lakeland Electric project manager for the reciprocal engine plant, said the track, which is owned by the city, was built in the 1980s and has annual inspections and continuous maintenance. Holdener said the engine had some damage but is “absolutely” fixable.
Lacy said by phone that the other five engines will be installed as scheduled and crews are “working around the clock to ensure the project continues to move forward with as little disruption as possible.”
Lacy also said the engine is insured.
The engines had already traveled more than 4,000 miles via cargo ship from MAN Energy Solution’s manufacturing plant in St. Nazaire, France, to the Port of Tampa, and then moved onto rail cars for transportation to Lakeland Electric’s C.D. McIntosh Power Plant.
Each engine will have its own generator. One generator was already nestled into place and another was set to join it during an engineering ballet involving an extended-bed tractor-trailer, a multi-story crane, along with a moveable crane within the new building, and moveable jacks.
All the engines, including the derailed one, should be in place by the end of November. The enormous building’s fourth wall will then be built to contain it all.
The RICE engines, McIntosh Unit 5, and the Larsen Plant are all fueled by natural gas. Lakeland Electric has used liquid natural gas to generate the overwhelming majority of its electricity since decommissioning McIntosh Unit 3.