Security Boom at Gentilly

The purpose of the boom was to protect the plant from potential attacks by small boats. Several terrorist attacks around the world were carried out in waterways in recent years. This led to efforts by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to establish how to further protect nuclear power plants in waterways.

In addition to being engineered to stop small boats travelling at high speeds from breaching the Security Boom, it was designed to resist the unique environmental conditions of the St. Lawrence River, most notably thick ice, drift ice, and tidal fluctuations in ice of up to 4 meters.