SANTA SUSANA MELTDOWN RELEASED MASSIVE RADIATION STATE-FUNDED PANEL ESTIMATES LEAK CAUSED 260 CANCER CASES.

Byline: KERRY CAVANAUGH Staff Writer

The 1959 nuclear reactor meltdown at the Santa Susana Field Lab released as much as 300 times more radiation than the infamous Three Mile Island accident, possibly causing some 260 cancer cases in an area near the hilltop lab, according to studies presented Thursday.

The estimates -- released by an independent advisory panel -- contradict years of assertions by the federal government that no radioactive material was released during the meltdown and that there was therefore never any public health threat to the surrounding community.

Taking seven years to complete, the new estimates rely on technical modeling to fill in missing details from the accident.

The Boeing Co., the lab's owner, immediately dismissed the research as completely wrong, and based on faulty assumptions.

Researchers conceded that their work is based on some assumptions and data from other meltdowns, but said they were forced to fill in the gaps when Boeing and the Department of Energy refused to provide key information on the accident needed to calculate exposure and cancer risk.

``What's critical here is that people have been exposed here unwillingly and without their knowledge,'' said Steven Wing, University of North Carolina associate professor of epidemiology and co-chairman of the Santa Susana Field Lab Advisory Panel, which commissioned the studies.

``To reduce people's anxiety, we need more information. We need more forthcomingness.''

Spurring change

Researchers also hope the new studies will spur tighter regulations on the cleanup of the field lab and its future use.

The new findings are part of several long-awaited studies looking at the impact of the field lab on nearby residents. The Santa Susana Field Lab Advisory Panel is made up of activists, residents and researchers. The work was paid for with $150,000 set aside by the state Legislature and $50,000 from a DOE citizens testing fund.

Earlier studies have found that lab workers exposed to radiation and certain rocket engine test chemicals had higher cancer death rates.

Situated on 2,900 acres in the Simi Hills above Chatsworth, West Hills and Simi Valley, the field lab was established in the 1940s to develop rocket engines and nuclear reactors for electricity. The lab owner, then Rocketdyne, conducted work for the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, which became part of the Department of Energy.

The site ultimately had several facilities that handled radioactive materials and 10 reactors, including the Sodium Reactor Experiment, which was highlighted on the Edward R. Murrow TV show ``See It Now'' as it delivered electricity to the then-tiny town of Moorpark.

In July 1959, the Sodium Reactor Experiment suffered a partial meltdown. The severity of the incident was covered up at the time, but the Daily News revealed a government report in 1989 that documented extensive contamination at the lab.

DOE and Boeing officials have always said that almost all the radiation was contained inside the reactor and that the only radioactive material to escape was inert gases that posed no threat.

In his study released Thursday, scientist David Lochbaum contends that two dangerous radioactive materials -- iodine-131 and cesium-137 -- were released in the accident. Lochbaum, the director of the Union of Concerned Scientists Nuclear Safety Project, based his conclusions on reports prepared after the meltdown that showed very high levels of radiation in the reactor, and that radioactive gas was released into the atmosphere.

But lacking data on those two materials from the meltdown, Lochbaum referred to experiments and accidents at similar reactors to gauge how much radiation may have been released in the Santa Susana meltdown.

He estimated that 6,500 curies of iodine-137 and 1,300 curies of cesium-137 were released. For comparison, the 1979 Three Mile Island meltdown in Pennsylvania is considered the worst commercial nuclear reactor meltdown in the U.S. That released 17 curies of iodine-131 and no cesium.

An estimate

In his final paragraph, Lochbaum acknowledges his conclusion is an estimate.

``It is both unsatisfying and frustrating not to be able to develop a more definitive basis for the estimated release fraction, but the scant and disconnected data prevent such analysis.''

Likewise, physicist Jan Beyea said he was denied records on which way the wind was blowing on the day of the SSFL meltdown. So he used data from the 1959 Windscale accident in England, transposed it onto the Santa Susana Field Lab and ran 20,000 simulations to estimate how much radiation residents may have been exposed to.

Based on estimates of how much iodine-131 and cesium-137 were released, Beyea figured 260 cancers would have been caused by the exposure -- although that number could be a lot less or a lot more, up to 1,800 cancer cases.

Data withheld

Those estimates infuriated Boeing Manager of Health, Safety and Radiation Services Phil Rutherford.

Rutherford also disputed complaints that crucial data on the meltdown was withheld, and he produced two thick binders of expert analysis that was prepared for Boeing's defense during a class-action lawsuit. That case, which charged that the lab made neighbors sick, was settled for $30 million last year.

Rutherford said there's no way iodine-131 was released into the atmosphere, saying the iodine would have reacted with the sodium in the reactor to form a solid that would have stayed put.

Based on old records, Rutherford said the company calculated that 28 curies of radiation was released and that the nearest resident in Simi Valley would have been exposed to .018 millirem, far less than the 300 millirem the average person is exposed to in a year.

``This is what the real exposure was,'' he said. ``This is what we stand by and this is what happened.''

Longtime field lab watchdog Mary Weisbrock said she hoped the study would educate the public about misconceptions about the field lab.

``The public has been led to believe the contamination stayed on-site,'' she said at a public meeting Thursday night in Simi Valley at which about 150 area residents listened attentively to the scientists. ``I'm surprised that 15 years have gone by and the public has been kept in the dark this long.''

kerry.cavanaugh(at)dailynews.com

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