Tunnel with nuclear waste collapse in Washington state
RICHLAND, Wash. — A portion of an underground tunnel containing rail cars filled with radioactive waste collapsed Tuesday at a sprawling storage facility in a remote area of Washington state, forcing an evacuation of some workers at the site that made plutonium for nuclear weapons for decades after World War II.
Officials detected no release of radiation at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation and no workers were injured, said Randy Bradbury, a spokesman for the Washington state Department of Ecology.
No workers were inside the tunnel when it collapsed, causing soil on the surface above to sink two to four feet (half to 1.2 metres) over a 400 square foot (37.1 square meters) area, officials said.
The tunnels are hundreds of feet long, with about eight feet (2.4 metres) of soil covering them, the U.S. Department of Energy said.
The cause of the collapse was not immediately known.
http://www.ctvnews.ca/world/tunnel-with-nuclear-waste-collapses-in-washington-state-1.3405242
https://www.democracynow.org/embed/story/2017/5/11/workers_fear_radiation_exposure_after_nuclear
Hanford Nuclear Reservation Declares Emergency After Tunnel Full Of Radioactive Waste Collapses
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2017/05/09/hanford-nuclear_n_16514918.html
SPOKANE, Wash. — A portion of a tunnel containing buried rail cars full of radioactive waste collapsed Tuesday at a sprawling storage facility in a remote area of Washington state, forcing an evacuation of some workers at the site that made plutonium for nuclear weapons for decades after World War II.
Officials detected no release of radiation at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation and no workers were injured, said Randy Bradbury, a spokesman for the Washington state Department of Ecology.
No workers were inside the tunnel when soil collapsed half to 1.2 metres over a 37.1 square-metre area. The tunnels are hundreds of metres long with about eight feet 2.4 metres of soil covering them, the agency said.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/emergency-reported-hanford-nuclear-site-washington/
“56 million gallons”
http://www.hanford.gov/page.cfm/WRPS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CDYZbZJmqc
Facebook.com/Hanford-Nuclear-Reservation-Hanford-Site-Watch
New data shows babies missing brains at 2,500% national rate in county by nuclear site — Mother: Officials “shut me down the minute I mentioned Hanford!… WE NEED ANSWERS!” — Experts: No birth defect is more extreme; It’s the most significant impact of radiation on developing embryos (AUDIO)
By ENENews Published: November 30th, 2014 at 4:58 pm ET
Emergency Declared at Hanford Nuclear Site After Tunnel Collapse
The U.S. Department of Energy in Richland, Washington, activated the Hanford Emergency Operations Center at 8:26 a.m. Pacific time Tuesday morning.
Anna King and Courtney Flatt, NWPR/EarthFix
May 9, 2017
https://kcts9.org/programs/earthfix/emergency-declared-hanford-nuclear-site-after-tunnel-collapse
Monitoring network detects minute trace of Fukushima radiation
February 2, 2017
For the first time, seaborne radiation from Japan’s 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster has been detected in a Canadian salmon, says UVic chemical oceanographer Jay Cullen, who leads the InFORM coastal network that monitors marine radioactivity off BC.
The single sockeye salmon contained a miniscule amount of cesium-134, the “fingerprint” isotope from Fukushima. The salmon was collected in Okanagan Lake in summer 2015 and was one of eight fish out of a total of 156 that tested positive for trace levels of cesium-137, also a manmade isotope, but not necessarily from Fukushima.
“With its roughly 30-year half-life, cesium-137 is still present in the environment from 20th-century nuclear weapons testing and Chernobyl, in addition to Fukushima,” says Cullen. The team did more intense analysis to determine if the telltale cesium-134 was also present.
“We took these same eight fish and measured them for 60 times as long as we normally do to look for the Fukushima fingerprint,” he says. “This is analogous to cupping your hand behind your ear to pick up a whisper from across the room.”
The level of cesium-134 in the one salmon was 10,000 times lower than Health Canada safety guidelines, which is nowhere near a significant risk to consumers, says Cullen.
“For perspective, you would need to eat 1,000 to 1,500 kg of salmon with this level of contamination in a short period of time to increase your radiation dose by the same amount as a single five-hour cross-country airplane flight.”
Testing in 2016 discovered one sockeye salmon from Sproat Lake on Vancouver Island with a “minimum detectable concentration” of cesium-137. Further testing is being done to determine whether it’s traceable to Fukushima.
The radiation plume from Fukushima has spread throughout the northeast Pacific from Alaska to California with maximum levels of contamination expected nearshore this year and next.
The InFORM network involves scientists in Canada and the US, health experts, non-governmental organizations—and citizen scientists along the BC coast who assist with the monthly collection of water, and annual collection of fish and shellfish samples for analysis.
The samples supplement measurements taken offshore by Fisheries and Oceans Canada and a citizen scientist network coordinated by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution that extends from the Bering Strait to San Diego.
“As the highest concentrations from this plume arrive in the next few years, we’ll continue to monitor radioisotope levels and what kind of risks they pose,” says Cullen. “Levels measured now and predicted at their peak are unlikely to represent a significant health risk to the marine ecosystem or public health in BC.”
InFORM is funded by the Marine Environmental Observation Prediction and Response Network. For more information, visit fukushimainform.ca
http://www.uvic.ca/home/about/campus-news/2017+a-minute-trace-of-fukushima-radiation-detected+ring
Fukushima radiation is reaching North America, but the water is still safe
New research has found that radiation from the 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan has reached more sites in the waters off the coast of North America.
The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution has found the highest level of contamination at a monitoring site about 1,600 miles west of San Francisco, with the sample returned as being 50 per cent higher than other samples.
However the level of radiation is still 500 times lower than the U.S. government safety limit for drinking water. There is also no concern for boating or swimming within the Pacific Ocean.
On March 11, 2011, a magnitude-9 earthquake struck off the coast of Japan, triggering a tsunami, killing more than 10,000 people and leaving hundreds of thousands homeless.
The massive earthquake also damaged the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant, causing three cooling systems to fail which resulted in partial meltdowns of some fuel rods. Contamination leaked out of the plant. That contamination has been carried along currents in the Pacific Ocean.
In 2012, Fukushima radiation was first detected 1,500 km off the coast of British Columbia.
Though the contamination is of concern, the levels are still eight to 10 fold less than when nuclear weapons were being tested in 1960s. And, according to Fukushima InFORM, a Canadian-based monitoring organization, the levels do not pose a risk to public health or the ecosystem.
from Dr. Dulai in Hawaii, Fish Radiation Levels https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WUQhpd0l8nY
“GREAT PACIFIC GENOCIDE”
source : http://www.cbr.washington.edu/dart postignoranceproject
source : http://www.cbr.washington.edu/dart postignoranceproject