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Contamination Fears Cancel Tonopah Mock Warheads Test
Tuesday, February 29, 2000 Associated Press RENO -- The Pentagon and Energy Department are dropping controversial plans to burn B-52 bomber parts and toxic materials at the Tonopah Test Range in Southern Nevada, Energy Secretary Bill Richardson said. Faced with fears about contamination of surrounding areas, the Energy Department has canceled a final environmental assessment of the proposed tests with mock nuclear warheads at Tonopah's fire experiment facility, Richardson said in a letter to Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., made public Monday. "The Departments of Energy and Defense have carefully reviewed the proposed experiments at the Tonopah Test Range using a B-52 bomber fuselage with mock nuclear weapons, including depleted uranium and beryllium have concluded not to proceed with these experiments," Richardson said. Nevada state officials and the Rural Alliance for Military Accountability based in Reno were among those who had objected to the testing. The group's executive director, Grace Potorti, had said the burning of the depleted uranium and up to 100 pounds of beryllium on the public lands warranted a full environmental impact statement. Reid, the Senate's second-ranking Democrat, praised Richardson's decision to scuttle the proposal aimed at generating data for computer models used to study the safety and reliability of nuclear weapons in accidents involving fire. "This plan was poorly conceived from the start and could have wreaked havoc on the environment by contaminating areas around the Tonopah Test Range with uranium and other toxic materials," Reid said Monday. There was no way to track how far the particles of uranium and beryllium would have traveled and no way to monitor the levels of contamination when it carried downwind, he said. "It is always better to be safe rather than sorry when people's health and safety are at stake," Reid said. Richardson did not specify in the letter to Reid why the environmental assessment would not be completed. A spokesman for DOE's office of congressional and intergovernmental affairs said from Washington Monday night no one was immediately available to comment. Reid spokesman David Cherry said DOE officials had acknowledged some of the concerns about the test had proven valid and that they "couldn't really with confidence calculate where the fallout would end up." |
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