Toxic Damage Low in Blast

An explosion in a Siberian nuclear reprocessing plant two weeks ago caused considerable physical damage but had little effect on the environment, a U.N. expert who inspected the site said Monday.

“The explosive chain reaction blew out the side wall of the plant, but there was very little toxic release and the damage to the environment was very low,” said Burton Bennett of the U.N. Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation.

Bennett was one of a team sent to the top-secret Tomsk-7 nuclear factory in Siberia last week by the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency. The three-member team carried out an independent assessment of the explosion in a reprocessing tank there April 6.

Bennett added that the cause of the explosion could be ascribed to human error: “You have to be careful; you have to do it properly. This was not the case.”