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Wildfire Threatens Los Alamos National Lab
The Los Alamos National Laboratory will be closed Monday as fire crews battle a wildfire raging nearby, a statement on the facility's website said.
A wildfire looms in the hills above Los Alamos National Labs Sunday. (Luis Sánchez Saturno/AP)
"All laboratory facilities will be closed for all activities and nonessential employees are directed to remain off site," the statement said. "Employees are considered nonessential and should not report to work unless specifically directed by their line managers."
The Los Conchas fire, which flared up Sunday afternoon, was reported to be less than a mile from the lab's southwestern boundaries late Sunday, another statement from the facility said.
Special crews have been dispatched to Water Canyon near the lab to protect the facility, according to the statement.
"All radioactive and hazardous material is appropriately accounted for and protected," the lab said.
Los Alamos, a center of American nuclear science, is one of the nation's top national-security research facilities.
It "enhances national security by ensuring the safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear stockpile, developing technologies to reduce threats from weapons of mass destruction, and solving problems related to energy, environment, infrastructure, health, and global security concerns," its website says.
The lab is about 35 miles northwest of Santa Fe, New Mexico, on 36 square miles of property owed by the Department of Energy. More than 11,000 employees work at the facility.
It is a joint project of Bechtel National, the University of California, the Babcock & Wilcox Co., and URS for the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration.
18 Comments so far
Show AllHoly Cow!!!!!!! This may be far more intense than the flooded nuclear plant in Nebraska.
I mean, i never even thought of this scenario.......And i doubt anyone in these 'high minded' and compassionate agencies did either. Is it 2012 yet?
Aren't you glad you don't work in the nuclear industry? Or own stock that supports their existence or future construction? Or vote for politicians who vow to build more nukes because they're so "green"?
Take them down, we demand it, in the name of the planet/
Take them down in the name of Mother Earth.
It "enhances national security by ensuring the safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear stockpile, developing technologies to reduce threats from weapons of mass destruction, and solving problems related to energy, environment, infrastructure, health, and global security concerns," its website says.
Bullshit!
Excerpt from "Wildfire Threatens Los Alamos National Lab", CNN, June 27, 2011:
"All radioactive and hazardous material is appropriately accounted for and protected," the lab said.
- - - - - -
Well, we can expect that drought driven wild fires will increase in frequency.
Besides Los Alamos how many other nuclear facilities have radioactive materials on site that might be vulnerable to wildfire and how much material may be at risk?
Oh, not to worry?
Los Alamos National Laboratory is a project of Bechtel National, the University of California, the Babcock & Wilcox Co., and URS for the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration.
Does anybody you know live in Santa Fe, New Mexico 35 miles southeast of Los Alamos?
Shouldn't be much in the area left to burn, since this happened before in the 2000 Cerro Grande fire:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cerro_Grande_Fire
Los Alamos "enhances national security by ensuring the safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear stockpile, developing technologies to reduce threats from weapons of mass destruction, and solving problems related to energy, environment, infrastructure, health, and global security concerns".
Heavens! Work on developing ever more nuclear horrors may be set back a few days, whatever will we do?
Barf!
66 years too late.
It's not too late. If we closed all the nuke plants and labs this year, we'd only have to deal with their radiation threat from global warming for another half billion summers.
"And who by fire, who by water...who shall I say is calling?"
Leonard Cohen