{"id":23536,"date":"2023-09-08T00:01:14","date_gmt":"2023-09-08T07:01:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/?p=23536"},"modified":"2023-09-08T04:26:17","modified_gmt":"2023-09-08T11:26:17","slug":"hanford-national-historic-park","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/2023\/09\/08\/hanford-national-historic-park\/","title":{"rendered":"Hanford National Historic Park"},"content":{"rendered":"
By Rob Morel<\/h6>\n

Joe\u00a0Gresh’s Oppenheimer<\/em> review reminded me of going to the Hanford National Historic Park up here in Washington along the Columbia River in the years before Covid.\u00a0 A lot of things have changed with Covid, and the tours offered by the US Park Service at the Hanford site.\u00a0 This article is about the Hanford site, the tours Hanford offered before Covid, the tours currently being offered, and the photos I collected during previous visits.<\/p>\n

Hanford is a place with a story.\u00a0 \u00a0Hanford was the world\u2019s first nuclear production facility, it was designed to produce plutonium for use in nuclear weapons, and it did.\u00a0 Plutonium produced here was used for testing at the Trinity Site in New Mexico during World War II and in the Fat Man bomb dropped on Nagasaki.\u00a0 The Hanford plant was built along the Columbia River because the reactors used Columbia River water for cooling.\u00a0 I\u2019ve been told that Hanford was the biggest and most expensive construction site in the US.\u00a0 The place covers just under 600 acres.<\/p>\n

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The air-conditioned bus that Hanford provides for getting around the site.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Hanford produced plutonium for several years after World War II.\u00a0\u00a0 The result was a set of serious issues with radioactive waste and contamination.\u00a0 Cleanup efforts are still ongoing, and are part of the Hanford tour.<\/p>\n

Before Covid, there were three tours available during the summer.\u00a0 Today, there are two.\u00a0 It\u2019s best to check with the Hanford site before visiting to find out what is available for any planned visit.<\/p>\n

Tour 1:\u00a0 The Full Meal Deal<\/h5>\n

A tour Hanford used to offer included everything (that\u2019s why I call it the Full Meal Deal).\u00a0 This tour required registering online in advance, and I found I had to do so as soon the registration page started accepting reservations.\u00a0 The tour slots filled up quickly for the entire summer. \u00a0When I last signed up, the government ran a background check on me ahead of time to make sure I was not a bad guy.<\/p>\n

The Full Meal Deal tour started in the morning and went most of the day.\u00a0 It included seeing the B Reactor (where the Nagasaki bomb plutonium was created), cleanup work that involved filtering underground water, and the vitrification plant being built to turn the highly radioactive sludge in the 1940s storage tanks into glass.\u00a0\u00a0 The vitrification process involves melting sand and mixing it with the radioactive waste to make it into a solid form.\u00a0\u00a0 This solid form can then be buried without fear of it leaching out into the water table.<\/p>\n

The Full Meal Deal tour includes a visit to the environmental restoration disposal waste facility.\u00a0 It is a covered, city-block-sized dump pit used for low level radioactive building materials, equipment, machinery, and other nasty stuff.\u00a0 The pit is lined with a barrier clay that absorbs radiation.\u00a0 Pumps remove any rain water that seeps into the covered materials.\u00a0 Hanford buries a level of radiated items across the bottom of the pit and then they cover it.\u00a0 That\u2019s followed by burying more on top of the previous layer and covering that.\u00a0 This will continue until they fill the pits. When the pits approach their capacity, Hanford plans to take any equipment used to haul the debris and bury it, too. When the pit is completely full, Hanford will to cover it.\u00a0 It will look like the surrounding desert when they are done.<\/p>\n

Tour 2:\u00a0 The B Reactor Tour<\/h5>\n

The B reactor tour includes (as the name implies) the B reactor, and I believe this tour is still offered. It provides a close up look at the reactor that made the Nagasaki bomb plutonium.\u00a0 As the name implies, it only includes the B Reactor.\u00a0 You can stay longer at the B Reactor than the Full Meal Deal tour above allowed, and Hanford opens up more of the building to explore.\u00a0 There are some places in the building you cannot go.\u00a0\u00a0 The off-limits area includes where the fuel rods were pushed out of the back of the reactor (after which they fell into a water tank, cooled, and were then transported by rail to a building that processed them into plutonium).<\/p>\n

There were nine reactors built at Hanford.\u00a0\u00a0 Of these, seven were cocooned in concrete to contain radioactivity and cool to safe levels. By 1987 they were all shut down.\u00a0 None are operational today.<\/p>\n

I didn’t get any photos other than the B Reactor. If I remember right, there were no cell phones or cameras allowed on the Full Meal Deal tour for security purposes.\u00a0 But I took photos of the B Reactor, as you can see below.<\/p>\n

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Hanford’s historic B Reactor. This reactor produced the plutonium used at Nagasaki.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Entering the belly of the beast: The Hanford B Reactor where spent nuclear fuel cells provided plutonium for the Nagasaki bomb.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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A model of the nuclear reactor showing the cooling and beryllium rods used to control the reaction.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The actual reactor, with cooling pipes on each side that used Columbia River water to cool the core.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The water plumbing. Some valves are taken apart. That satisfies the Russians that the Reactor is non-operational. This is a part of the nuclear arms agreement. The Russians actually inspect the reactor to verify it is shut down. We do the same for their reactors.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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A signature. Was this a previous worker at Hanford?<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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A clock that shows when the plant was shut down.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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A control center for watching core power and temperature.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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There were no computers in Hanford back in the 1940s.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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More open valves.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Another view of some of the reactor controls and monitors.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The train used to transport highly radioactive highly radioactive depleted fuel rods for further processing into plutonium.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Beryllium balls used for controlling the nuclear reaction.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Massive amounts of air were needed for ventilation.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Personal Protective Equipment. Hanford was not a typical office job.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
Tour 3:\u00a0 The Old Hanford Town Site Pre-War Tour<\/h5>\n

In my opinion, there\u2019s not much to see on this tour. \u00a0There\u2019s a farming area where the previous inhabitants were told to leave at the start of the Manhattan Project. There is what’s left of the old concrete high school.\u00a0 The tour guide explained that someday Hanford hopes to restore it.\u00a0 You can see the old roads that went through the town and where the ferry crossed.\u00a0 The history the guide presented made it worthwhile.<\/p>\n

Another Option<\/h5>\n

You can go to www.vtours.hanford.gov<\/a> and take a virtual tour if you’re not able to go in person.<\/p>\n

The Bottom Line<\/h5>\n

Look online (Hanford\u00a0 National Historic Park<\/a>) for more info. I don\u2019t think they are doing the Full Meal Deal tours since Covid (other than online virtual tours).\u00a0 Hanford is offering the B Reactor and Old Hanford tours the last time I checked (on a first come, first served basis).<\/p>\n

I recommend a visit to the Hanford site, either in person or the virtual tour.\u00a0 The Hanford National Historic Park reveals a world that few of us have ever seen.\u00a0 It is an important part of our history.<\/p>\n

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