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WASHINGTON - Divine Strake, a massive explosives test originally planned for next month at the Nevada Test Site, has been put on hold.
The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) said Friday it was postponing the test - which entails detonation of 700 tons of explosives - so it can reassess the potential for radioactive contaminants left in the ground from earlier nuclear tests becoming airborne.
Darwin Morgan, a spokesman at the Nevada Test Site, said the agency plans to do additional sampling at the blast site to measure background radiation in the soil.
"We'll do the analysis of background radiation, what will happen as it's suspended into the dust cloud, and that will become part of our finding'' for the environmental assessment, Morgan said.
The test will be put off until agency completes the new studies. Its findings could lead it to reaffirm its earlier decision of no significant impact or it could order even more in-depth environmental studies, leading to still further delays of the test.
The decision comes after concerns were raised by Nevada environmental officials, Utah's U.S. Sen. Orrin Hatch and Rep. Jim Matheson, and a lawsuit by Utah Downwinders, who blame deaths and illnesses on exposure to Cold War nuclear testing.
"We have always been concerned about background radiation at the site. We have been repeatedly told, even during my staff's visit to the site, that this was not a concern," Hatch said in a statement. "But since we've asked them to back up their conclusions with scientific evidence, it looks like our concerns are justified."
Matheson said he became concerned after reading about "mushroom clouds" and low-yield nuclear weapons, and urged the Pentagon's Defense Threat Reduction Agency to release all the health and safety data "so that people's fears about being once again exposed to radioactive contamination could be addressed."
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., also had asked Defense Threat Reduction Agency to hold public meetings to answer questions about the test and is happy to hear about the delay and outreach effort.
"It is incumbent upon the Department of Defense to take every possible precaution before going ahead with tests of this kind," said Reid spokeswoman Sharyn Stein.
The Pentagon also has committed to holding public meetings in Utah and Nevada to answer questions about the tests.
"Clearly the public wants to know, have a better understanding of that background radiation, what is going to happen to it," Morgan said. "There is a clear concern from the Downwinders and we understand that and we need to better explain it so they can understand it."
The National Nuclear Security Administration already had issued a revised environmental assessment earlier this month and postponed the test from June 2 to sometime after June 23 after it was sued by the Utah Downwinders and a Nevada Indian tribe.
"We need to make sure the concerns that have been raised have been satisfied before moving on with that," said Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah.
The Divine Strake test entails the detonation of 700 tons of explosives. The goal is to measure the ground tremors that would be produced and use the information to build computer models to simulate explosions.
Originally, Defense Department budget documents said that the test would help war planners choose the smallest possible nuclear weapon to destroy buried and fortified targets, but the Pentagon later said that the inclusion of the word "nuclear" in the document was a mistake.
The blast would use explosives similar to those used in the bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building, but the blast would be 280 times larger. It would also be nearly 50 times larger than the biggest known conventional weapon in the U.S. arsenal and on par with the smallest U.S. nuclear weapons.
That fact, along with efforts by the Bush administration to repeal a ban on development of low-yield nuclear weapons, prompted concern among nonproliferation advocates that the aim was to create new tactical nuclear weapons.
Vanessa Pierce, program director at the Healthy Environment Alliance of Utah, said it is hard to imagine that the soil at the test site wouldn't be contaminated from past nuclear testing, and the Friday announcement lends weight to those suspicions.
"We hope the NNSA will conduct a thorough and independent analysis of the soil out there to ensure the public isn't put at risk by fallout from this test," Pierce said. That testing should be done by an entity outside of the Pentagon or Energy Department.
"Ultimately, the safest way to protect health from any contaminated fallout would be to cancel the test altogether," she said.
Not so divine
* What: A federal agency withdrew its finding that a huge explosives test planned for Nevada next month will have little environmental impact.
* Next: Agencies will do additional studies to see if radioactivity already in the ground could cause environmental or health problems if it becomes airborne.
* Possible outcomes: The agency could reaffirm its earlier decision of no significant impact or order more in-depth environmental studies that could delay the explosion even further.