DOUNREAY nuclear power station in Scotland was evacuated earlier this month after 'human error' led to a radioactive leak, it has emerged.

Work in an area of the site, which is about 25 miles from John O'Groats, was temporarily halted after low levels of radioactive contamination were detected.

The site, which was operational between 1954 and 1994, is currently being dismantled and the land cleaned up.

An employee at the plant near Thurso in Caithness made the detection on June 7.

READ MORE: Dounreay: The massive and most complex nuclear clean-up in Europe

Dounreay Site Restoration Ltd said the worker was wearing protective clothing and had since returned to work.

It said there was no risk to other staff or the public and the incident was rated "zero", the lowest level on the International Nuclear Event Scale.

The Herald:

Nuclear industry regulator, the Office for Nuclear Regulation, was informed.

Details of the emergency were presented to a meeting of the Dounreay Stakeholder Group on Wednesday night.

Dounreay Site Restoration Ltd said: "As a precaution work in the area stopped immediately and an investigation was launched.

"There was no risk to members of the public, no increased risk to the workforce and no release to the environment."

Managing director Martin Moore said: “The contamination was very local but it wasn’t in a place it should have been, normally.

“The levels were insignificant but they should not have been there so we cleared the area and then had a controlled re-entry.”

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He added: “It came down to a lack of due diligence in monitoring around one of the barriers."

"It was human error. It shouldn’t have happened and we’re very disappointed that it did.

“We took this very seriously and the teams responded well and our investigation is well under way.”

A spokesman for the Scottish Environment Protection Authority said: “This investigation is ongoing and we have served notice on DSRL to provide some additional information."

An interim end state, when the decommissioning work has been completed, is expected to be reached between 2030 and 2033.