[ RadSafe ] A Little Bit of History

[Peter.Vernig at med.va.gov]

Group,

I attended a tour of the former nuclear weapons facility at Rocky Flats
which is incidentally 9 miles [~15 km] from my house yesterday afternoon.
The tour group and I saw the last part of the last building in the so called
industrial area come down.

All that remains on the site are the former security and administrative
building near a state highway, which has been leased or sold and adjacent to
it a warehouse where deliveries were made outside of the security area.
That warehouse now also houses the administration and ID section.
Additionally there is a water tank in the former industrial area.  They are
using the water for dust suppression in demolishing that last building and
then the water tower comes down.  There is also an aluminum shack that the
US Fish and Wildlife Service requested be left for vehicle garaging.  The
industrial area about 1000 acres will remain under DOE control as they have
water monitoring sites there.  The buffer zone, about 5000 acres will be a
wildlife refuge.

The work remaining is to finish demolishing that building and ship it off to
a land fill in Utah and regarding and earth moving to fill in where
buildings were and return the site to the original contours.

Every plutonium component in the current US weapons arsenal was built at
that plant.

Any opinions in this e-mail are solely those of the author, and are not
represented as those of the VA Eastern Colorado HCS, the Dept. of Veterans
Affairs, or the US Government.

Peter G. Vernig, Radiation Safety Officer, MS-115, VA Eastern Colorado
Health Care System, 1055 Clermont St. Denver, CO 80220,
peter.vernig at med.va.gov, Phone= 303.399.8020 x2447; Fax = 303.393.5026,
alternate fax, 303.393.5248

"...whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is lovely, whatever is
admirable, if anything is found to be excellent or praiseworthy, let your
mind dwell on these things."

Paul of Tarsus