page_title: Nuclear labor issues
section_title: Fernald Feed Plant – Ohio, US
hierarchical_section_title: Nuclear labor issues / American nuclear industry / Nuclear weapons production facilities / Fernald Feed Plant – Ohio, US
caption_attribution_description: English: Fluor Fernald Workers are Expected to Finish Pneumatically Removing Thorium-Bearing Waste from Silo 3 in November 2005. More Than 1,400 Containers (3-cubic yards each) Have Been Filled Since March.
context_page_description: Nuclear labor issues exist within the international nuclear power industry and the nuclear weapons production sector worldwide, impacting upon the lives and health of laborers, itinerant workers and their families.
  A subculture of frequently undocumented workers do the dirty, difficult, and potentially dangerous work shunned by regular employees. They are called in the vernacular Nuclear Nomads, Bio-Robots, Lumnizers, Glow Boys, Radium Girls, the Fukushima 50, Liquidators, Atomic Gypsies, Gamma Sponges, Nuclear Gypsies, Genpatsu Gypsies, Nuclear Samurai and Jumpers. When they exceed their allowable radiation exposure limit at a specific facility, they often migrate to a different nuclear facility. The industry implicitly accepts this conduct as it can not operate without these practices. The World Nuclear Association states that the transient workforce of "nuclear gypsies" – casual workers employed by subcontractors – has been "part of the nuclear scene for at least four decades."
  Existent labor laws protecting worker's health rights are not always properly enforced. Records are required to be kept, but frequently they are not.
context_section_description: For decades, radioactive isotopes of plutonium, uranium, radium, thorium and technetium were released from the Fernald Feed Materials Production Center in Ohio, entering into the air, land and water, including deep ground water of the Great Miami aquifer. Workers and area residents show higher rates of systemic lupus erythematosus, certain cancers, and low blood cell counts. A study by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) determined that salaried workers had lower mortality rates than per-hour workers, despite both cohorts increased malignancies of blood, bone, spleen, lymph and thyroid cancers. While the plant was under construction in 1952, labor disputes broke out between carpenters and other laborers, in what was reported as  "rioting" and "mob action". In 1954, a chemical explosion causes the death of two workers. In 1959, a strike ensues at the factory regarding the quota system. Machinists, steel workers and sheet metal workers strike. In 1974, employees voice their concerns over health hazards. In 1984, National Lead of Ohio, the manager of the site, admits that radioactive dust was released, and groundwater contaminated. In 1990, Fernald employees and/or their survivors filed a class action suit over health hazards.
caption: Fluor Fernald Workers
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