Small Radioactive Spill Crushes O.C. Commute

One of the nation’s most notorious freeway interchanges became a commuter’s nightmare Wednesday when a truck hauling low-level radioactive medical waste overturned, shutting down the southbound Santa Ana Freeway for about seven hours.

The truck was traveling south about 2 p.m. when a car rear-ended it, California Highway Patrol officers said. The truck then slammed into the center divider, careened back across the freeway and landed on its side, throwing out one 55-gallon drum carrying biomedical waste, state health officials said.

Authorities said the double-sealed drum was hurled 35 feet but had only a dime-sized rupture and no serious leak.

But as a precaution, hazardous-materials specialists from several agencies spent hours combing the area for any other sign of spillage, causing a 10-mile traffic backup. The five other drums in the truck containing medical waste and 16 containers carrying other chemicals had been tossed about but had not ruptured, they said.

“I was afraid [inspectors] would go down there and there’d be stuff scattered all over the road,” said Edgar Bailey of the state Department of Health Services.

Mario Martinez, who was supervising freeway-widening work near the accident scene, said he heard a loud screech and then the slam of impact as the car hit the truck. When he looked up, he saw the truck driver flailing his arms at the steering wheel as if he was losing control of the vehicle.

Railings and a light pole prevented the truck from falling into the Santa Ana River, Martinez said.

“It looked for a second like he might go over,” Martinez said. “He was sliding on the rail; then he hit this light pole, which kicked the rear end of the truck back onto the road.”

Another witness, Henry Ramos, 36, said, “It was like watching a movie, everything went so fast. I was just keeping an eye on the truck.”

The truck driver, Gerald Nelson, 54, ran back toward the car that had struck him and another car it had then collided with to see if anyone needed help. Nelson was treated at an area hospital for minor injuries and released, hospital officials said.

The driver of the first car, George Stathopoulos, 64, suffered a cut on the left side of his head, authorities said. He was listed in satisfactory condition at UCI Medical Center.

The truck, which was heading to Vista-based PWN Environmental, was carrying vials of carbon-14, sulfur-35 and phosphorus-32, which are commonly used in biomedical research, often to find a new drug agent or the cause of a disease, said Bailey, chief of the state’s radiological health branch, which sent two inspectors to the scene. The truck also was hauling about 18 containers of various other chemicals, firefighters said.

About one-10th of a cup of liquid escaped from the ruptured drum, he said. Field tests did not turn up heightened radiation levels outside the drums, he said. Workers in moon suits used “wipes,” similar to filter paper, on the drums, so that full laboratory analysis could be done at UC Irvine.

The drums were placed in specially built 80-gallon containers with absorbent material and taken to Thomas Gray and Associates in Orange, Bailey said.

Bailey said inspectors for the radiological health branch of the Health Department, based in Los Angeles, were not notified of the 2:07 p.m. incident until nearly 3:45 p.m., and then, slowed by heavy traffic, did not reach Santa Ana until almost 5:45 p.m.

“It’s not a real good response time,” he said. The state learned of the incident from the transporting company.

Until this summer, the state contracted with the Orange County Health Care Agency for radiological health matters. But in a controversial move in June, county officials shut down their in-house radiological health program, leaving five inspectors without jobs and turning responsibility over to the state.

Bailey said the state plans to open an Orange County office shortly, which should shorten response time for such incidents.

While 38 firefighters investigated the spill, southbound traffic was rerouted at State College Boulevard to the Garden Grove Freeway. The freeway reopened at 8:45 p.m.

The northbound lanes of the freeway remained opened.

One drum was discovered in the Santa Ana riverbed, but it was empty and firefighters weren’t sure if it even came from the truck. Fire and police officials kept bikers and walkers off the trails along the river, but determined there was no need to evacuate a nearby school and apartments.

The accident occurred near the infamous Orange Crush, where the Santa Ana, Garden Grove and Orange freeways converge, providing 34 routes--including onramps and offramps--for more than 600,000 cars a day traveling in 66 lanes over 13 bridges. “The Guinness Book of World Records” describes it as the most complex highway interchange in the world.

“It’s a mess out there,” Mauldin said. “The [afternoon] commute started at 3, and this happened around 2. It has been very difficult for the folks to get home.”

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Also contributing to this report were Times staff writers Deborah Schoch and Thao Hua.