Portion of tunnel containing nuclear waste collapses at Hanford

[Zippyjuan]

http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-hanford-nuclear-emergency-20170509-story.html

An emergency has been declared at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in southeastern Washington after a portion of a tunnel that contained rail cars full of nuclear waste collapsed.

Workers at the site of the tunnel collapse Tuesday morning were evacuated. No workers were in the tunnel. Workers farther away were told to remain indoors.

Randy Bradbury, a spokesman for the Washington state Department of Ecology, said there apparently has been no release of radiation and no workers were injured.

For decades, Hanford made plutonium for nuclear weapons and now is engaged in cleaning up the nation's largest volume of radioactive defense waste.

The accident occurred at a facility known as PUREX, in the middle of the sprawling Hanford site, which is half the size of Rhode Island, Bradbury said.

Hanford is near Richland, about 200 miles southeast of Seattle.

The closed PUREX plant was part of the nation's nuclear weapons production complex.

It contains about 56 million gallons of radioactive waste, most of it in 177 underground tanks.

Bradbury said the collapse occurred at one of two rail tunnels under the PUREX site.

In the past, rail cars full of radioactive waste were driven into the tunnels and then buried there, he said.

Hanford has more than 9,000 employees.

The site was built during World War II and made the plutonium for most of the U.S. nuclear arsenal, including the bomb dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, at the end of the war.

 

[Anti Federalist]

 

[NorthCarolinaLiberty]

And why is this in the Politics Forum?

 

[JK/SEA]

And why is this in the Politics Forum?

Zippy's dad is a democrat rep in that district.

 

[devil21]

And why is this in the Politics Forum?

I'm wondering why Zippy would post this at all. The Zippy account doesn't post anything without a direct purpose.

 

[dannno]

I'm wondering why Zippy would post this at all. The Zippy account doesn't post anything without a direct purpose.

Sometimes he posts filler.

 

[NorthCarolinaLiberty]

Sometimes he posts filler.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking. Sort of ingratiating. Like TheCount posting in the motorcycle thread. Or Sonny Tufts acting like he's the RPF Perry Mason champion with the IRS bullies.

 

[shakey1]