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Worries Of Radioactive Leaks From 'Concrete Cap' In Marshall Islands

Tuesday: August 19, 2008

(Sydney Morning Herald)

Thirty years after the United States built a massive concrete dome in the Marshall Islands to cap highly radioactive waste from nuclear weapons testing, the facility has cracks that concern islanders who fear radiation is leaking into the lagoon of Enewetak atoll, the Sydney Morning Herald reports.

In an exclusive report based on reporter Ivan Broadhead’s month-long trip to the Marshall Islands, including a trip to Enewetak atoll, the newspaper confirmed cracks in the concrete dome at Runit island. The cap, about the size of three U.S. football fields, was built over a nuclear test bomb crater that was filled in with radioactive waste, including topsoil from other islands in the atoll and test towers.

Enewetak was the site of 43 of the 67 U.S. nuclear weapons tests conducted in the Marshall Islands between 1946 and 1958. The other test site was Bikini atoll.

Cracks in the Enewetak atoll concrete cap were first discovered 18 years ago, but a recent inspection by a U.S. Department of Energy engineer said they were only hairline in size and did not pose a threat to islanders, who were allowed to return to the atoll’s southern islands in 1980.

"The islanders subsist on fish from the lagoon. If there are cracks below and seepage of radioactive particulates, then we are in a very big mess. I hope to God this will never be the case. It would have both national and regional implications,” Marshalls President Litokwa Tomeing told the newspaper.

The newspaper, through a Freedom of Information Act request, unearthed a 1980 memo by Navy Vice Adm. Robert Monroe, who oversaw the Runit dome project. That document, which was done a year after the Runit facility’s completion, raises concerns about the dome’s structural integrity. According to the newspaper, it says, "All those present seemed to realize radioactive material was leaking out of the crater and would continue to do so."

However, Washington says it is not responsible for the maintenance of the Runit dome. "The US has no formal custodial responsibilities for the site,” it says.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/nursing-a-nuclear-test-hangover/2008/08/17/1218911461036.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap2