Tunnel appears to collapse at Hanford nuclear waste site in Washington state
Channel: Jany Home
Date: 09/05/2017

Tunnel appears to collapse at Hanford nuclear waste site in Washington state

Hundreds of workers at the Hanford nuclear waste site in Washington state have been ordered to “take cover” after a portion of a tunnel contaminated with radioactive materials appeared to collapse.

The U.S. Department of Energy said it activated its emergency operations protocol after reports of a “cave-in” at the 200 East Area in Hanford, a sprawling complex about 200 miles from Seattle where the government has been working to clean up radioactive materials left over from the country’s nuclear weapons program.

The Energy Department said in a statement that officials were “responding to reports of a cave-in of a 20 foot section of a tunnel that is hundreds of feet long that is used to store contaminated materials.” The tunnel is next to the Plutonium Uranium Extraction Facility, also known as PUREX.