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Good ol' #KerrMcGee. You remember them, right? #KarenSilkwood's employer!

Karen #Silkwood's sudden death unpacked in ABC documentary

The four-part podcast unearths never-before-heard audio tapes.

ByDoc Louallen
November 14, 2024

"Fifty years ago, the death of a 28-year-old #plutonium plant worker and whistleblower in Oklahoma -- a death many found mysterious and sparked decades of speculation -- shocked the nation.

"The official story was that Karen Silkwood died in a one-car crash on Nov. 13, 1974. She was on her way to meet a New York Times journalist, reportedly to hand over documents she'd secretly been collecting at her job at a #NuclearFacility. The Oklahoma State Highway Patrol concluded that Silkwood fell asleep at the wheel -- possibly under the influence of prescribed drugs --- drove off the highway, crashed into a ditch, and died.

"'We’ve never believed it,' Mike Boettcher said of the official narrative. Boettcher and his reporting partner Bob Sands, both veteran Oklahoma journalists, say many in Oklahoma speculate that Karen Silkwood may have died for what she knew.

"Silkwood's story has become widely known, inspiring several books, articles, and a major motion picture.
Silkwood worked at a nuclear fuel production plant that manufactured #plutonium fuel rods to power a new type of nuclear reactor, which was part of a multi-million dollar experiment to enhance #nuclear energy. When she noticed what she felt were #unsafe working conditions -- such as leaks, spills and co-workers frequently getting #contaminated with #RadioactiveMaterial -- she spoke up and tried to make improvements.

"'Karen became nuclear energy's first #whistleblower, though the term whistleblower was just starting to be used,' Boettcher said. 'This was at a time when the idea of someone inside of a big corporation exposing alleged misdeeds was shocking.'

"Silkwood's allegations, contamination, and untimely death sparked an investigation by the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, an FBI inquiry, a civil lawsuit, several appeals, a congressional hearing and two appearances before the U.S. Supreme Court."

Some good news! Though potential contamination from long-term storage needs to be addressed (what else is new).

#EPA to Relocate Toxic #UraniumMine Waste from #NavajoNation

By Neely Bardwell, January 08, 2025

"The Environmental Protection Agency will move #uranium mine waste from #ChurchrockNewMexico to the #RedRock regional landfill where it can be safely stored forever.

"The federal agency signed an action memo to transport radioactive waste at the Quivira Mining Co. Churchrock Mine to a disposal site at the Red Rock regional landfill about six miles east of the Village of Thoreau. The cleanup will begin in early 2025 and continue for 6-8 years.

"For the Red Water Pond Road Community Association (#RWPRCA), which has advocated for waste removal since 2006, the decision marks a significant shift in addressing #UraniumContamination on Navajo land.

"'Removing the mine waste from our community will protect our health and finally put us back on a positive track to #Hózhǫ (balance),' said Teracita Keyanna, RPWPRCA executive committee member. 'I think this decision empowers #grassroots organizations like ours and our allies to continue to advocate and educate to clean up hundreds of abandoned uranium mines that threaten our #Diné communities every day.'

"RWPRCA President Edith Hood said the community has dealt with the impact of uranium mining since the late 1960s. Commercial mining began at the site under #KerrMcGee Corporation, which later became the #QuiviraMiningCompany. The operation extracted an estimated 1.3 million tons of uranium ore before closing in 1986. The Navajo Nation currently has more than 520 documented #AbandonedMines, with no disposal facilities for uranium waste within 350 miles of #TribalLands.

"'Many of us suffer chronic health problems and a degraded homeland as a result,' Hood said. 'We advocate for a regional approach to addressing remediation of nearly 100 abandoned uranium mines in the Eastern Navajo Agency. We are committed to making sure the removal of mine waste from our community does not threaten the health and safety of our Diné neighbors.'

"Previous attempts to address the waste proved unsuccessful. In 2011 and 2013, the EPA and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission approved a plan to place 1 million cubic yards of waste from NECRM on top of the existing tailings pile located half a mile from RWPRC village. Effectively, neither of those wastes were removed from the communities.

"The #RedRockLandfill currently handles municipal waste from McKinley and Cibola counties and Navajo Nation communities as far away as Tuba City. The planned #UraniumDisposalCell will occupy a separate area of the 640-acre site adjacent to the shuttered #Escalante power plant.

"The Northwest New Mexico Regional Solid Waste Authority (#NNMRSWA), which owns the landfill, must show that its operations can protect #GroundWater, air and soil, while safeguarding public health for decades to come. The New Mexico Environment Department will oversee long-term monitoring of the site.

"Chris Shuey, who has documented mining and #milling impacts in the #Churchrock area for 40 years as an environmental health specialist at Southwest Research and Information Center in Albuquerque, said relocating uranium waste is essential for tribal communities.

"'Removing mine wastes from Navajo communities to engineered, regional disposal sites is a #PublicHealth imperative,' Shuey said, noting that more than half of all Navajo chapters have at least one source of unhealthy uranium exposure. 'The federal government must continue looking for suitable sites for long-term disposal of mine wastes to protect current and future Navajo populations.'

"'This decision will remove over 1 million cubic yards of waste that has haunted the #RedWaterPondRoad and #PipelineRoad communities for too long,' EPA Pacific Southwest Regional Administrator Martha Guzman said in a statement.

"'This solution is a compromise that will get #RadioactiveWaste in this area off of the Navajo Nation as soon as possible,' Navajo Nation President #BuuNygren said in the EPA statement. 'It’s not everything the three affected communities would wish for but it’s action in the right direction now rather than in the future. Most importantly, this will protect our people from harmful exposure.'"

Source:
https://nativenewsonline.net/environment/epa-to-relocate-toxic-mine-waste-from-navajo-nation
#NoNukes #NoWar #NoMiningWithoutConsent #NoUraniumMining #UraniumMills #NukingTheNavajo #Genocide #WaterIsLife #NativeAmericanNews #HaulNo

Diné elders resist eviction from Big Mountain

Debra O'Gara and Guerry Hoddersen, August 1986

"Forced relocation. The words bring to mind the Trail of Tears, Nazi concentration camps, and the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. Past atrocities, not present and future ones.

"But on the #BlackMesa surrounding Big Mountain in northeastern Arizona, over 11,000 #Diné (Navajo) are facing a new holocaust: removal by armed U.S. troops from their ancestral homelands in an area jointly held by the Navajo and Hopi nations.

"The U.S. media bills the government’s role as peacemaker in a #Hopi vs. #Navajo war. But the reality is very different at Big Mountain.

"For over 50 years, #mining companies have sought to exploit the rich mineral resources that lie beneath the land now occupied by the #Navajos. To do this they first secured the assistance of the federal government, which in the 1920s and ’30s unilaterally replaced the traditional forms of government, based on clan elders, with malleable tribal councils. Over the years these councils have been only too willing to negotiate mineral leases, and the elite who run the councils have gotten rich doing it.

"Now, giant energy #corporations like #PeabodyCoal, #KerrMcGee, and #Exxon want unhampered access to the estimated 44 billion tons of high-grade #coal and deposits of oil, natural gas, and #uranium found on and around #BigMountain.

"There’s only one problem: the traditional Diné who live on the land will not move voluntarily.

"So once again the energy moguls have turned to their servants in the government and the Hopi council for help.

"Forced relocation, the holocaust hatched in corporate boardrooms, has in fact gathered formidable support: it is endorsed by Congress, covered up by the press, and sanctioned by a phony tribal leadership."
#CulturalGenocide #ForcedRelocation #NativeAmericans #EnvironmentalRacism #ThackerPass
https://socialism.com/fs-article/dine-elders-resist-eviction-from-big-mountain/

#KerrMcGee

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