Over the weekend monitoring equipment was lowered into the underground at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant for the first time since a radiation release was detected on Feb. 14. Workers lowered radiation and air quality instruments Friday and Saturday down the salt handling and air intake shafts, and initial findings showed “no detectable radioactive contamination in the air” and “ normal” air quality results, according to a Department of Energy release. “These results were expected because the shafts that were sampled were not in the air flow path coming from the area where the radiation release originated,” the release states.
For the next step in the recovery effort, workers could be sent underground as early as the end of this week to identify the source of the release. That depends on positive final results from the instruments sent down. “This process is critical in helping determine the proper personal protective equipment needed for our personnel entries,” Tammy Reynolds, WIPP Recovery Process Manager for WIPP contractor Nuclear Waste Partnership. “We will do a final analysis of these samples before we send anyone down. The safety of our employees is foremost during this process.”
The Department also said that four additional workers have tested positive for “just over background” contamination in fecal samples, in addition to the 13 workers previously identified as testing positive. “There has been no detectable contamination in urine samples, which indicates contamination was not inhaled into the lungs,” the release states. “The levels of exposure are extremely low, and none of the employees is expected to experience any health effects from the exposures. The four most recent positive results were at the barely detectable level (about .1 disintegrations per minute), and reflect extremely low levels of exposure.”
