Current and former nuclear weapons workers in the Greater Denver area are invited by the Department of Labor to show up at a Sept. 12 information session on federal occupational illness benefits.
Labor Department representatives will be on hand at the Arvada, Colo., session to help attendees with filing new claims or assisting with existing ones under the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act, the federal agency said in a Wednesday press release.
During a morning session there will be presentations by the Labor Department, Department of Energy and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.
“The U.S. Department of Labor encourages all former nuclear weapons workers and their families in the metro Denver area to attend this outreach event to learn more about their eligibility for federal health benefits,” Division of Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Director Rachel Pond said in the release.
The program offers lump-sum compensation and medical benefits to workers, or their survivors, for illnesses connected to occupational radiation and toxic exposure. Radiation-induced cancer, chronic beryllium disease, beryllium sensitivity and chronic silicosis, are among the covered illnesses, according to a meeting notice.
Thousands of employees once worked at DOE’s Rocky Flats nuclear plant, which operated for roughly 40 years until 1992, making plutonium pits: the fissile cores for nuclear weapon first stages. Rocky Flats was also the site of a June 1989 raid by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Environmental Protection Agency over suspected environmental illegality. Nuclear production work was suspended later that year, resumed in 1990 but then halted altogether in 1992 at the order of President George H. W. Bush.
No pre-registration is needed to attend the session commencing at 9 a.m. Mountain Time. Assistance will be provided to attendees on a first-come, first-serve basis.
