Teams Recover Equipment From Flawed A-Test Site
Workers have begun removing damaged equipment from an alcove contaminated with radiation in a flawed nuclear weapons test last April, but they still do not know what caused the problem.
Chris West, a spokesman for the Department of Energy, said a team of 10 workers entered the alcove Monday and began removing equipment such as computer data discs and film packs.
“We’re not sure if the information on the equipment is going to be any good because of the radiation,” West said Tuesday. “What we learn will determine what we do in the rest of the areas. We haven’t tried to bring out any of the equipment itself.”
Officials say $20 million worth of equipment may have been damaged when radiation seeped into alcoves along a tunnel where the Mighty Oak nuclear test was conducted April 10.
The workers who entered the alcove Monday were exposed to radiation amounting to about 200 millirems an hour. West said that level of exposure was not a health problem.
“They wore protective clothing and were not in the area that long,” West said. “No one was exposed to anything that could be considered a problem.”
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