Investigators Admit Leak of Plutonium

After two months of denying radiation was released in an explosion at the Hanford nuclear reservation, federal officials admitted that a tiny amount of plutonium did escape the Plutonium Reclamation Facility on May 14, when an explosion in a chemical tank severed a waterline, flooding the building and flowing through a door. Some of the flooding occurred around plutonium-processing equipment and washed plutonium traces out of the building, said Ron Gerton, leader of the U.S. Department of Energy team that investigated the blast.