Just 10 day's after the 20 foot section of tunnel caved in at Hanfords Nuclear waste site , came more news of a possible Leak in a double shelled tank Tank AZ-101. according to the Washington Department of Ecology, The tank contains 800,000 gallons of nuclear waste. AZ 101 was put into service in 1976. The tank’s life was expected to last 20 years. Now it has been holding hot, boiling radioactive and chemically contaminated waste for 41 years.
Similar to the incident that occurred in late 2011 with a double shelled tank AY-102.
The tank was found to be leaking nuclear waste into it's safety space known as the annulus.
A situation that should have been dealt with immediately , However WRPS passed it off as rain water instead of nuclear waste.
Again in 2016 the situation had worsened with an accumulation of 8 inches of radioactive sludge building up in the annulus .
The failure of AY-102's may lead to an environmental catastrophe, and what it could mean for the other 28 double shelled tanks is disconcerting . When the leak was first discovered, it prompted the DOE to investigate the other 28 double-shelled tanks. Verdict ? The twelve other tanks have similar construction flaws to AY-102.
On May 19th 2017, a seven person crew preforming a routine job , sent a robot into the safety space of the double shelled tank to check and evaluate the structural integrity of the aging tank.
Normally the equipment comes up clean,but not this time. A radiation specialist on the crew detected higher than expected readings. to about three times what it should have been .
They found radioactive material on one of the workers on three spots , on one shoe ,his shirt and on his pants .
The contaminated items were removed ,bagged and disposed of.
This came as a shock to workers because the contamination was not expected .
There was no liquid in the safety space of AZ 101, but the contamination of the robot was enough to cause concern.
It still could be a leak, and they will be doing on going testing in the days to come .
