Cleanup at Shieldalloy

dogg57

Piney
Jan 22, 2007
2,912
375
Southern NJ
southjerseyphotos.com
NEWFIELD -- The fate of a pile of radioactive waste in the borough is once again in the hands of the state.
After nearly a year of review, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission voted Wednesday to return oversight of cleanup efforts at the Shieldalloy Metallurgical Corp. site to the state.
"We're completely satisfied with the quality and rigor of New Jersey's regulatory program," said Neil Sheehan, public affairs officer for the federal agency's Region I.
Shieldalloy ceased production in 2006 after manufacturing metal products in Newfield for more than four decades. The former smelting facility has proposed collecting radioactive waste created there in a single pile and then capping it off with an engineered barrier, such as rock and soil.
http://www.thedailyjournal.com/arti...hieldalloy?odyssey=tab|topnews|text|FRONTPAGE

http://www.epa.gov/Region2/superfund/npl/0200203c.pdf
 

G. E. Mclaughlin

New Member
Nov 9, 2011
3
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62
Sea Isle City, NJ
I worked for a contractor that crushed cement and other materials like the slag at shield allow. I work there for at least three months, and had no idea that the slag was radio active. The process of crushing the slag with a reciprocal crusher produced clouds of dust. I was working a laborer, breathing in the green dust which had a sulfur odor to it. I wore only a dust mask, which in the heat of the sun would become completely saturated with sweat, and collect the dust till I had to take it off to be able to breathe.

I know I inhaled allot of the dust during the time I was working there. It wasn't till the people living in the surrounding area Newfield, complained about the dust plums which were passing through the air depending on which direction the wind was blowing toward, that the EPA did a Fly over and put a stop to the slow being crushed. The solution to be able to continue crushing the slag, for use who knows where, was to have a man with a Geiger counter point out the piles of slag which had the lowest level of radiation.
My lungs have to have been full of the slag dust before the crusher was moved to a new municipality to crush some other waste material.

I wonder how long till the radio active isotope generated by the crusher which I inhaled will cause my demise.

am not afraid to know or looking to sue the contractor I was working for, and this is no fish story. It just would be a good thing to know, so that I could make a bucket list. Would any one know the answer to this?
:clint:
 

dogg57

Piney
Jan 22, 2007
2,912
375
Southern NJ
southjerseyphotos.com
“Shieldalloy will fight until they cannot fight any more,” Sweeney said. “They are going to continue to play games and drag this out. There is no question about that ... the sadness here is that the people of Newfield have to live with this mess.”“I have an outstanding staff and we are going to stay on top of it,” said Sweeney, whose staff includes “experts on Department of Environmental Protection issues.” “The state has taken the position of moving the pile out of there. I — along with John [Burzichelli] and Celeste [Riley] — am not going to not drop the ball.”

http://www.nj.com/gloucester-county/index.ssf/2011/11/sweeney_stays_on_top_of_slag_i.html
 

G. E. Mclaughlin

New Member
Nov 9, 2011
3
0
62
Sea Isle City, NJ
“Shieldalloy will fight until they cannot fight any more,” Sweeney said. “They are going to continue to play games and drag this out. There is no question about that ... the sadness here is that the people of Newfield have to live with this mess.”“I have an outstanding staff and we are going to stay on top of it,” said Sweeney, whose staff includes “experts on Department of Environmental Protection issues.” “The state has taken the position of moving the pile out of there. I — along with John [Burzichelli] and Celeste [Riley] — am not going to not drop the ball.”

http://www.nj.com/gloucester-county/index.ssf/2011/11/sweeney_stays_on_top_of_slag_i.html
I worked for Garoppo Inc. in the late 80's early 90's and was a laborer for him and we went to different municipilpalities, and crushed waste asphalt and concrete, for use as road bed. We where crushing the slag pile for about 4 months before the EPA came out to the site becuse of complaints of the dust created by the crushing process. What kind of rate of exsporesure to the radio active elements would you suppose I had breathing in the dust unprotected.???
 

Teegate

Administrator
Site Administrator
Sep 17, 2002
25,602
8,177
It is a scary thought about what you were breathing in. It seems to me it would be prudent to do some research on how to recognize symptoms that might arise in the future. And get yourself checked often for any problems that might arise.

Guy
 

G. E. Mclaughlin

New Member
Nov 9, 2011
3
0
62
Sea Isle City, NJ
It is a scary thought about what you were breathing in. It seems to me it would be prudent to do some research on how to recognize symptoms that might arise in the future. And get yourself checked often for any problems that might arise.

Guy

I had a cat scan done last year, no sign of anything significant.
On a sad side note my Father in law from my first marriage worked there too, and did some wielding inside the crushing machine ( slag wore out the carbon baffles), and ran a front end loader picking up and dumping in the slag, died two years back from metastatic cancer. Slowly and painfully, he hated to have morphine it knock him out, and refused any treatment because it would just prolong his life with diminished quality and not cure the cancer, He didn't even take comfort care at the very end ( A New Jersey’s Kevorkian that's is written up as respiratory failure to be politically correct for the soccer Moms ).
 

dogg57

Piney
Jan 22, 2007
2,912
375
Southern NJ
southjerseyphotos.com
Company appeals ruling on N.J. nuclear slag cleanup

A company has appealed a ruling that found New Jersey regulators should overse

its decommissioning of a site containing nuclear materials instead of federal officials.
The state's regulations are more stringent and could cost Shieldalloy Metallurgical Corp. far more to clean up its closed facility in the south Jersey town of Newfield.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission ruled last month that New Jersey's Environmental Protection Department can have jurisdiction. The state could force the company to ship the radioactive waste to a facility in Utah.
The company says it would be safer to keep the slag in New Jersey.
The subsidiary of Wayne, Pa.-based Metallurg Holdings Inc., on Tuesday requested that a federal court in Washington intervene.
Nov. 23, 2011 from courierpostonline
 
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