In the 1950's in the hills between the San Fernando Valley and Simi Valley an experiment was being conducted. An experiment so secret the population in the immediate vicinity was completely unaware of the program. This was the Rocketdyne Nuclear Field Program. Why was a nuclear reactor this dangerous with no containment placed near residential neighborhoods and schools. This reactor program was an accident waiting to happen.
This was the SRE or Sodium Reactor Experiment. This was a totally different type of reactor than most. The SRE used Sodium for a coolant rather than water. This is a much less expensive way of producing nuclear energy, but it is also more dangerous. Sodium can catch fire if exposed to air or water.
A process called venting was also conducted on a regular basis. This involves the intentional release of radioactive vapors due to the production of nuclear energy. Neighborhoods such as Hidden Hills , Bell Canyon, Conoga Park and Woodland Hills and and most of Simi Valley were all exposed to large doses of radiation. There are still cancer cluster's in these areas even today. This was in the Early days of the Nuclear Industry and the full danger of Uranium and Plutonium were not fully understood yet.
Simi Valley was the first area in the country to be powered entirely by Nuclear Energy.
Nuclear accidents occurred at the facility until 1970 with several other meltdowns. They just were not on the scale of the 1959 incident.
The SRE Program was operated by the Rocketdyne Corporation in conjunction with the Atomic Energy Commission.
The reactor was located at the Santa Susanna field laboratory. This facility was almost on top of residential neighborhoods.
The most disturbing aspect of this case is the reckless, irresponsible manner in which the plant was operated. The guidelines we have today to safeguard the public were either not in place at the time or simply ignored.
In 1959 the sodium rods melted and the reactor lost collant. The sodium rods caught fire and caused a major meltdown of the nuclear fuel. The cause of this was neutron bombardment of one of the lubricating agents used in the system. The bombardment causing it to turn to a tar like substance and blocking the coolant.
The reactor was housed in a standard warehouse type structure with no containment. The containment is the dome shaped structure over the reactor so in case of an accident the radiation will be kept confined.
This nuclear accident was Three Hundred times the radiation exposure of Three Mile Island. Only two other nuclear meltdowns were worse. The Wind Scaled meltdown in England and the Chernobyl Disaster in the Soviet Union.
The evidence of the meltdown was discovered in the mid 1990's at UCLA. One of the engineers on the program took a position at the University and brought all the documents with him to study. A group of students discovered them in the University Library .
To this day neither Rocketdyne nor the Atomic Energy Commission will discuss the case.
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