LOS ANGELES - The nuclear reactor meltdown at the Santa Susana Field Laboratory in 1959 may have resulted in hundreds of cancer cases in the community due to the release of harmful radioactive emissions, according to a report by an independent advisory panel released on Thursday.
The report estimated that the reactor meltdown might have caused at least 260 cases of cancer in a 60-mile radius in eastern Ventura County, where the reactor was located. The Santa Susana Field Laboratory Advisory Panel, which conducted the research said that there was a slight chance that the number of cancers may be as high as 1,800.
The panel said they could not be sure of the numbers since the federal government as well as Rocketdyne, which owned the lab, have blocked access to key details of the incident. "They won't even release the information as to which way the wind blew during the meltdown," said Dan Hirsch, co-chair of the panel informed.
But Hirsch admitted that the data was still valuable. For more than two decades, people were asking about the fallout of the reactor meltdown and the study fills a gap in the details, he said. "These studies indicated that quite a bit of radioactivity might have been released."
Rocketdyne has maintained through the years that the meltdown did not release enough radiation to cause health risks. However the panel revealed that the nuclear bust-up released nearly 459 times more radiation than an identical incident at Pennsylvania's Three Mile Island in 1979.
Mike Lopez, project manager for the Energy Department's cleanup division said that the conclusions of the panel were contradictory to a review by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 2003, which said the area was no risk. He added that they had been testing the ground and the water near the lab for several years.
The site, which is now owned by Boeing, is continuously speculated about. Recently rocket fuel additive perchlorate was found in a well in the area. This chemical can cause thyroid cancer, but Boeing said that it had not come from the area.
Hirsch though believes the site poses a "continuing threat to the public."
