Radiation at El Toro Hangar Unresolved

Marines who worked in the north mezzanine of Hangar 296 were at risk of exposure to Radium 226 and its radioactive decay products.

Robert O'Dowd and John Uldrich watch as machines move dirt around near Hangar 296. Salem-News.com photo: Bonnie King

(IRVINE, CA) - An old WW II hangar over 200,000 square feet in area at former MCAS El Toro will not be on any tourist list now and maybe for years to come.

Hangar 296 is one of the primary sites of the TCE plume spreading into Orange County and reason for the base’s placement on the National Priority List (NPL), commonly referred to as the EPA Superfund.

The California Department of Public Health continues to hold the old hangar in a radiological restricted category, even though the Navy reported the hangar free of radiation.

The rub is the hangar constructed in 1944 was the site of a Radium 226 paint room and the state didn’t accept the Navy’s remediation efforts and request to release the hangar for unrestricted use.

Hangar 296 remains in a radiological restricted category nearly 10 years after a Navy radiological survey and report by Roy F. Weston, Inc., dated July 2002, found the hangar free of radiation.

Weston reported that the Navy took steps to dispose of contaminated ventilation and plumbing off-base in a designated site for radioactive material. Hangar 296 is over 200,000 sq. feet in area. The area contaminated with Radium 226 was confined to portions of the north mezzanine. Radium 226 was also found in the groundwater near several landfills on the base and near the hangar.

Marines who worked in the north mezzanine of Hangar 296 were at risk of exposure to Radium 226 and its radioactive decay products.

Review of the Weston report showed that the area previously occupied by the Radium 226 paint room and supporting rooms was converted to administrative work space and used by Marines in the 1960s and possibly until the base closed in 1999.

Radium 226 when mixed with zinc sulfide creates radioluminescent paint. The Marine Corps and the other services used this mixture to paint aircraft instruments and dials over 50 years ago. The radioluminescent paint allowed pilots to see their instruments at night.

Since El Toro was designated for closure in 1999 and reversion to state control, the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) under an agreement with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission assumed responsibility for monitoring radiological issues at the former base.

The CDPH did not agree with 2002 Weston report and refused to release the hangar from its restricted radiological category. Follow up with CDPH in 2009 found that the state had concerns with the Weston radiological survey of the hangar. These concerns still exist today.

This week the DTSC, the lead state agency for El Toro, confirmed that Hangar 296 is shuttered and no uses of any kind are allowed by the Navy.

The reasons for the radiological restricted use of the hangar are not known. One possibility is that the plumbing under the Radium room was contaminated and the old sewer line may be contaminated with radiation. If this is the case, it could cost the Navy millions to dig up the old sewer line and disposed of it in a hazardous waste site.

At the end of January 2012, the Navy submitted a radiological site inspection work plan to CDPH. Once the CDPH and the Navy agree to a final work plan, the Navy will proceed with the work, submit a final inspection report to CDPH who will make a determination if the hangar is fit for unrestricted radiological release or some kind of remedial action is warranted.

Radium 226 has a half life of 1,620 years. So even after 16 centuries half of the contaminant will still be active. Obviously, this is not something you want in your backyard.

Bob O’Dowd is a former U.S. Marine with thirty years of experience on the east coast as an auditor, accountant, and financial manager with the Federal government. Half of that time was spent with the Defense Logistics Agency in Philadelphia. Originally from Pennsylvania, he enlisted in the Marine Corps at age 19, served in the 1st, 3rd, and 4th Marine Aircraft Wings in 52 months of active duty in the 1960s. A graduate of Temple University, Bob has been married to Grace for 31 years. He is the father of two adult children and the grandfather of two boys. Bob has a blog site on former MCAS El Toro at mwsg37.com. This subject is where Bob intersected with Salem-News.com. Bob served in the exact same Marine Aviation Squadron that Salem-News founder Tim King served in, twenty years earlier. With their combined on-site knowledge and research ability, Bob and Tim and a handful of other ex-Marines, have put the contamination of MCAS El Toro on the map. The base is highly contaminated with TCE, trichloroethelyne

You can email Bob O’Dowd, Salem-News.com Environmental and Military Reporter, at this address: consults03@comcast.net