A truck carrying equipment contaminated at the Hanford Site’s Plutonium Finishing Plant traveled to two other sites on the Energy Department property and then off-site before the problem was discovered.
Employees at the cleanup site in eastern Washington state received a DOE message about the incident in early August.
The incident occurred amid preparations to resume demolition and related operations at the Hanford plant, after most work was stopped following a spread of radioactive contamination in December.
On July 26, a worker for Hanford support services contractor Mission Support Alliance removed a spreader bar from a radiological buffer area at the plant, believing incorrectly it had been surveyed for contamination. Upper-level managers at the project led by CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation Co. were unaware the equipment was being removed. The spreader bar is used to distribute weight for objects being hoisted.
The truck then made a couple stops, including at a contractor facility in nearby Richland, before the spreader bar was unloaded at a central Hanford laydown yard and then later moved into a building used to store hoisting and rigging equipment. There the equipment was surveyed and discovered to have low levels of contamination – approximately 230 disintegrations per minute per 100 centimeters squared were detected.
The equipment has been moved to an area at Hanford with radiological controls. A survey of the locations where the truck traveled found no contamination, according to the message to employees.
The incident would be one focus of an assessment of CH2M’s readiness to resume demolition and related activities at the plant, according to the message to workers. The assessment began Aug. 13 and was expected to continue for two weeks. Work could resume as soon as September. CH2M has changed its protocols on the release and movement of materials within the Plutonium Finishing Plant’s radiological buffer area to maintain accountability, workers were told.
