NORTHWEST
East Oregonian
A2
Thursday, July 11, 2019
New report warns of potential
radiation release at Hanford
By ANNA KING
Oregon Public Broadcasting
RICHLAND, Wash. —
A new federal report says
that a massive building at
the Hanford Nuclear Site
is worse off than managers
thought.
The so-called PUREX
— Plutonium Uranium
Extraction — plant isn’t
clean. Starting in 1956 the
plant processed loads of
plutonium. Its walls are up
to 6 feet thick, and it’s as
long as three football fields.
PUREX is located
within Hanford’s 200 East
Area. It’s about 7 miles
from the Columbia River
and 5 miles from State
Highway 240.
Locals call these large
buildings with deep under-
ground walls “canyons.”
They’re also called “Queen
Marys” because of their
long shape resembling
ocean liners sailing amid
the sagebrush.
Now, the behemoth can-
yon is slowly degrading.
Final cleanup isn’t slated
for more than a decade,
around 2032. After study-
ing the PUREX plant, the
federal government has just
released a new plan that
would stabilize the build-
ing for now. But it’s hard to
AP Photo, File
The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife on Wednesday authorized killing some
members of a wolf pack that are preying on cattle in the northeastern corner of the state.
Contributed Photo, File
A new federal report says that a massive building at the
Hanford Nuclear Site is worse off than managers thought.
balance all the urgent clean-
ups on the site, according
to Theresa Howell with the
Washington State Depart-
ment of Ecology. There’s 56
million gallons of radioac-
tive sludge stored in aging
underground tanks, too.
“It’s an ongoing strug-
gle at Hanford to continue
to get funding to address
all of the risks out there,”
Howell said. “So this is
one way to get a little bit of
movement forward.”
If not dealt with soon,
Washington state officials
say they worry the PUREX
plant will contaminate the
environment.
The new federal report
underscores that worry,
saying: “the 202A Building
[PUREX] has degraded.
Spread of contamination
has been observed through-
out the building and has the
potential to continue as the
facilities degrade.”
Besides PUREX, there
are three similar facili-
ties at Hanford that need
to be torn down: U Plant,
REDOX and B Plant.
Forecast for Pendleton Area
TODAY
FRIDAY
SATURDAY
SUNDAY
MONDAY
Partly sunny
Partly sunny
Mostly sunny
Mostly sunny and
pleasant
Rather cloudy
87° 60°
90° 61°
PENDLETON TEMPERATURE FORECAST
90° 63°
84° 59°
86° 60°
HERMISTON TEMPERATURE FORECAST
92° 63°
94° 65°
95° 66°
89° 61°
90° 63°
OREGON FORECAST
ALMANAC
Shown is today’s weather. Temperatures are today’s highs and tonight’s lows.
PENDLETON
through 3 p.m. yest.
HIGH
LOW
TEMP.
Seattle
Olympia
72/58
81/55
87/56
Longview
Kennewick Walla Walla
88/62
Lewiston
77/59
91/63
Astoria
71/57
Pullman
Yakima 88/59
76/55
89/63
Portland
Hermiston
81/63
The Dalles 92/63
Salem
Corvallis
79/57
Yesterday
Normals
Records
La Grande
84/57
Bend
83/57
82/52
87/58
Ontario
99/68
Caldwell
Burns
WINDS (in mph)
95/65
89/52
Boardman
Pendleton
Medford
89/61
0.00"
Trace
0.07"
4.55"
5.10"
5.77"
Today
Fri.
WSW 6-12
WNW 6-12
WSW 6-12
WNW 6-12
SUN AND MOON
Klamath Falls
86/49
Forecasts and graphics provided by AccuWeather, Inc. ©2019
Sunrise today
Sunset tonight
Moonrise today
Moonset today
5:17 a.m.
8:44 p.m.
3:55 p.m.
1:40 a.m.
Full
Last
New
First
July 16
July 24
July 31
Aug 7
NATIONAL EXTREMES
Yesterday’s National Extremes: (for the 48 contiguous states)
High 112° in Thermal, Calif. Low 29° in Angel Fire, N.M.
NATIONAL WEATHER TODAY
some members of the pack
alive.
Conservation groups con-
tend that repeatedly killing
wolves in the same area does
not stop cattle depredations.
“Instead,
our
wild-
life agency should walk
its own talk about using
innovative solutions,” said
Sophia Ressler of the Cen-
ter for Biological Diversity,
which opposes the killing of
wolves.
“State and federal offi-
cials could find an alternate
grazing allotment that isn’t
such fantastic wolf habitat,”
she said.
Wolves were wiped out
in the state by the 1930s on
behalf of livestock inter-
ests. But the animals started
returning to the state early
this century from surround-
ing areas. Most of the wolves
live in the northeastern cor-
ner of the state, where they
have prompted numer-
ous conflicts with livestock
producers.
The WDFW said the
state had a minimum of 126
wolves in 27 packs with 15
successful breeding pairs
last year. For the first time, a
wolf pack was found living
west of the Cascade Range.
Gray wolves are no lon-
ger listed as an endangered
species under federal protec-
tion in Eastern Washington.
They are still federally pro-
tected across the rest of the
state, although the federal
government is considering
lifting those protections.
Susewind said the OPT
pack has repeatedly preyed
on cattle on federal graz-
ing lands in the Kettle River
Range.
Last year, the OPT pack
was involved in 16 dep-
redations in less than two
months. That prompted the
WDFW to kill two members
of the pack last September,
leaving two members alive.
The WDFW said the pack
has since grown to five adult
wolves and four pups.
The rancher involved in
this case has taken numer-
ous steps to protect his live-
stock from wolves, and
efforts to kill some wolves
will begin almost immedi-
ately, the agency said.
The agency said it will
kill one or more wolves and
then evaluate whether more
need to be killed to prevent
livestock depredations.
Two rural Oregonians from
#TimberUnity visit White House
By SIERRA DAWN
MCCLAIN
Capital Press
PRECIPITATION
John Day
Eugene
SPOKANE, Wash. —
The Washington Depart-
ment of Fish and Wildlife on
Wednesday authorized kill-
ing some members of a wolf
pack that are preying on cat-
tle in the northeastern corner
of the state.
Agency director Kelly
Susewind said the state will
kill part of the OPT pack,
for the second year in a row,
in an effort to change the
behavior of the pack.
The action comes after
a cow was found on Satur-
day in Ferry County that
had been killed and partially
consumed by wolves.
“This is a very diffi-
cult situation for all those
involved, especially given
the history of wolf-livestock
conflict in this area,” Suse-
wind said. “Our goal is to
change this pack’s behavior.”
Wolf tracks were seen
near where the cow was
found, the agency said.
Last year, the agency
killed several members of
the OPT pack that were
preying on livestock, but left
86°
65°
88°
58°
106° (1975) 46° (2009)
24 hours ending 3 p.m.
Month to date
Normal month to date
Year to date
Last year to date
Normal year to date
Albany
80/58
0.00"
0.02"
0.10"
9.59"
6.49"
7.67"
By NICHOLAS K.
GERANIOS
Associated Press
through 3 p.m. yest.
HIGH
LOW
TEMP.
Pendleton 80/54
80/59
24 hours ending 3 p.m.
Month to date
Normal month to date
Year to date
Last year to date
Normal year to date
HERMISTON
Enterprise
87/60
83/61
85°
62°
88°
58°
106° (1975) 40° (1911)
PRECIPITATION
Moses
Lake
77/56
Aberdeen
82/59
84/61
Tacoma
Yesterday
Normals
Records
Spokane
Wenatchee
77/60
State OKs killing of wolf pack
members preying on cattle
WASHINGTON, D.C. —
Two representatives of Ore-
gon’s #TimberUnity move-
ment were at the White
House Monday, where they
had been invited to hear Pres-
ident Donald Trump deliver
remarks on “America’s envi-
ronmental leadership.”
The president had invited
Todd Stoffel, of GT Stoffel
Trucking, and Marie Bow-
ers, of Bashaw Land & Seed,
to represent Oregon’s truck-
ing, logging and agricultural
industries.
“It’s not very often that
you get invited to the White
House, especially as a rural
Oregonian,” said Bowers.
“Just the honor of that was
pretty astounding.”
The president’s invitation
came after the 2019 Oregon
Legislative session, which
brought thousands of rural
Oregonians — along with
their tractors and trucks —
to the Capitol in Salem to
protest controversial climate
bills, such as House Bill
2020, a bill to limit carbon
emissions.
The group #TimberUnity,
which Stoffel and Bowers
represented at the White
House on Monday, started
as a grassroots effort to fight
HB 2020 and is now a reg-
istered political action com-
mittee devoted to standing
up for loggers, ranchers,
truckers and other work-
ing-class Oregonians.
In his speech Mon-
day, Trump focused on his
administration’s
environ-
mental achievements. He
said his priorities were pro-
moting the “cleanest air,”
“crystal clean” water, reduc-
ing carbon emissions and
“being a good steward of
public land.”
The president invited his
various administration offi-
cials, including Environ-
mental Protection Agency
Chief Andrew Wheeler and
Interior Department Chief
David Barnhardt, to take
turns at the lecturn.
Trump has raised the ire
of environmental groups
by rolling back more than
80 environmental regula-
tions and withdrawing the
U.S. from the Paris climate
change accord.
In his speech, the presi-
dent said he withdrew from
the Paris agreement because
it disadvantaged American
workers and taxpayers.
“Punishing Americans
is never the right way to
protect the environment,”
he said. “We will defend
the environment, but we
will also defend American
prosperity.”
Trump also said that he
does not support the “Green
New Deal” Democrats in
Congress are pushing for,
which he claimed would cost
the U.S. nearly $100 trillion.
“That’s not affordable
even in the best of times,” he
said.
Bowers, who helped lead
the fight to kill HB 2020 in
Oregon, said she agrees with
the president. “My biggest
takeaway from this weekend
is that you shouldn’t ‘fix’ the
environment at the cost of
jobs,” she said. “The two
aren’t mutually exclusive.”
Bowers said that she and
Stoffel, along with the rest
of the #TimberUnity move-
ment leaders, are continu-
ing to formulate what their
movement means and what
it will stand for moving
forward.
“There are a lot of issues
we could stand for that don’t
get attention,” she said.
“The main thing is that
we’ll be advocating for nat-
ural resources and working
people.”
Stoffel
couldn’t
be
reached for comment.
Shown are noon positions of weather systems and precipitation. Temperature bands are highs for the day.
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showers t-storms
10s
rain
20s
flurries
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snow
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