April 23, 1979 - 41 years ago, the day after Earth
Day
Radioactive waste from the meltdown of
the reactor at Three Mile Island being
unloaded after being trucked to Hanford
to be dumped in the
UNLINED, LEAKING commercial radioactive
waste dump trenches in the center of
Hanford (AP, Idaho Press photo
4-23-1979)
41 years ago today, this radioactive
waste from the meltdown at Three
Mile Island was trucked to Hanford
and dumped into the unlined, leaking
commercial radioactive waste dump in
the center of Hanford.
For ten years, Heart of America
Northwest has been providing legal
and expert support for the Yakama
Nation because the waste leaking
from this dump is now estimated to
cause 3 to 5% of their children to
get cancer if they use the plants
and water as guaranteed by their
Treaty rights.
For the day after Earth Day, I
thought this was a significant
reminder - of the legacy we leave
future generations and the urgency
of our work. And the importance of
committing ourselves to environmental justice.
The photo
above accompanied
a story
in the Idaho
Press that I was featured in,
discussing how Hanford facilities
with massive amounts of radiation
could cause large scale catastrophic
releases in an earthquake. The
releases would expose Idaho
residents, who have suffered for
years from being downwind of the
Nevada Test Site and Hanford.
Ironically, US DOE and Washington
State Ecology have refused to hold
public meetings or hearings on
Hanford decisions in Spokane,
despite it being the major downwind
population and medical center.
Here's an excerpt from this week's
Idaho Press article:
In a time before
social distancing, the lecture
hall of the Idaho College of
Osteopathic Medicine was packed.
Students, staff, politicians and
community members sat intermixed
in the seats, elbow to elbow.
But Kaaren
Brodesser stood alone....she is
a witness, part of a small group
of people fighting for the
rights of Idahoans whose lives
changed on July 16, 1945, when
the U.S. conducted the
first-ever nuclear test, setting
off a series of events the world
is still struggling to fully
understand.
These are
downwinders, and they are
dying....
“We have to be
prepared for a potential
widescale release,” said
Washington State Representative
Gerry Pollet. Pollet is the
executive director of the Heart of America Northwest,
a citizen watchdog group focused
on the cleanup of the Hanford
site and nuclear safety in the
Northwest.
Pollet said the
earthquake threat to Hanford is
twofold: one, an earthquake to
area could cause the facilities
at Hanford to structurally fail
and release plutonium and other
radionuclides into the air. Two,
an earthquake could cause a
disruption in the water used at
the facilities. On site there
is, for lack of a better word, a
swimming pool that provides
constant cooling water to
counteract the heat of the
nuclear waste. A "reasonably
sized" earthquake, Pollet
explained, has the potential to
prevent water from getting to
the pool. Without that water,
the waste would be exposed to
air, overheat, and catch fire.
"The Energy
department has sworn for years
that they're going to move ahead
with plans to get that waste out
of the pool and into dry
storage. But with the budget
proposal from the Trump
administration, it can't be
funded this next fiscal year,"
Pollet said.
