Tunnel Collapse at Hanford Nuclear Waste Site
May 11th, 2017Via: CBC:
When workers at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in southeastern Washington state suddenly found a hole in the ground on Tuesday morning, there was cause for concern.
Nowhere in the United States is there more nuclear waste and radioactive contamination than at Hanford, which has been the focus of a massive, complex cleanup effort by the U.S. Department of Energy since 1989. The site was used for decades to produce weapons-grade nuclear fuel, beginning with the Manhattan Project and the Second World War.
It just so happened that this hole — a “subsidence of soil” according to the Energy Department — had appeared above a concrete tunnel with radioactive equipment stored inside. The concern was that if the roof of the tunnel collapsed it could release long-trapped contaminated material into the air.
While a portion of the tunnel roof did collapse, officials said “there is still no indication of a release of contamination from the hole.” But that’s not to say the site — which was never designed to hold this much waste for as long as it has — doesn’t pose other environmental risks.
