国产热热热精品,亚洲视频久久】日韩,三级婷婷在线久久,99人妻精品视频,精品九热人人肉肉在线,AV东京热一区二区,91po在线视频观看,久久激情宗合,青青草黄色手机视频

World / US and Canada

Inspectors locate contaminated area in US nuke dump

(Xinhua) Updated: 2014-04-19 15:53

HOUSTON -- Inspectors have located the contaminated area of a nuclear waste repository in the southern US state of New Mexico, which has been shut down for more than two months due to a radiation leak.

The discovery was made during the fourth visit by inspectors into the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, an underground dump located near Carlsbad in southeastern New Mexico, local TV KOB quoted energy department officials as saying Friday.

Tammy Reynolds, deputy recovery manager of the US Department of Energy, told media that on Wednesday inspectors detected elevated radiation levels as they approached a panel used to store nuclear waste.

The inspectors had to retreat before pinpointing the exact source of contamination because they had been underground for five hours in protective gear and the batteries on their respiratory equipment were running low, Reynolds said.

They are expected to make more trips into the dump next week to find out what caused the leak and the extent of the contamination. US officials said earlier that they could possibly deploy robots to inspect the area if it is unsafe for humans to continue the recovery work.

The radiation leak occurred on Feb. 14 and contaminated 21 workers, though their levels of exposure were said to be "extremely low" and well below those deemed unsafe.

The prolonged closure of the repository has forced Los Alamos National Laboratory, a nuclear weapons manufacturing facility in New Mexico which used to store its refuse at the plant, to relocate its radioactive waste to Texas.

The cause of the radiation leak still remains unknown. A truck fire was reported at the underground site nine days before the leak and prompted evacuations, but officials said the fire was in a different part of the site and did not seem related.

The repository stores "transuranic waste" leftover from nuclear weapons research and testing from the nation's past defense activities, according to the website of the energy department. The waste includes clothing, tools, rags and other debris contaminated with radioactive elements, largely plutonium.

Trudeau visits Sina Weibo
May gets little gasp as EU extends deadline for sufficient progress in Brexit talks
Ethiopian FM urges strengthened Ethiopia-China ties
Yemen's ex-president Saleh, relatives killed by Houthis
Most Popular
Hot Topics

...
湘潭市| 河南省| 兴义市| 迁安市| 阿拉善盟| 常熟市| 江都市| 固安县| 尉犁县| 东莞市| 德安县| 鄂托克旗| 峨山| 黔西县| 孝昌县| 汤原县| 彩票| 九龙县| 鹤壁市| 博野县| 从江县| 兴国县| 油尖旺区| 阳山县| 顺平县| 新兴县| 黑山县| 安龙县| 锦州市| 白玉县| 讷河市| 揭阳市| 宣武区| 青岛市| 浪卡子县| 罗源县| 赫章县| 建昌县| 石首市| 安西县| 太谷县|