NASA said it will move forward with plans to demolish the Bravo and Coca vertical test stands at the Santa Susana Field Lab, contaminated when the area was used to test rocket engines and other activities for decades.
Built in the 1950s, the Alpha, Bravo, Coca and Delta test stands were home to rocket testing for NASA’s Space Shuttle program and for U.S. Air Force missiles. Later the sites would play a major role in buoying the Apollo program, which launched the first American astronauts to the moon.
Those activities, however, left the area contaminated with radioactive and chemical toxins, affecting nearby communities. For decades, activists have been calling for the cleanup of the sprawling area hidden in the hills between San Fernando and Simi valleys.
Pre-demolition work will begin this month as crews complete biological surveys to ensure demolition doesn’t impact the health and safety of workers, the public and nearby cultural and biological resources, according to NASA.
The site is encircled by communities of Chatsworth, Thousands Oaks, Canoga Park, West Hills and Simi Valley where nearly 400,000 people reside. After years of negotiations and agreements, a full-scale cleanup of the area has still not been launched.
The demolition of the Bravo test stands and control house is expected to the completed by the end of 2022. After that, NASA will proceed with leveling the Coca Test Area and is set to finish that phase by 2023. A timetable for demolition of the remaining stand, Delta, has not yet been announced.
Peter Zorba, NASA SSFL project director said in a statement that “completing demolition will allow us to begin cleanup as soon as DTSC completes their regulatory process.”
Supporters of the full cleanup of the site responded warily. Critics say that NASA already agreed under the terms of a binding deal with the state in 2010 to clean the soil on to the most stringent standard and tearing down the test stands is not aligned with the agreement.
West Hills resident and leading activist Melissa Bumstead wondered whether “NASA is testing the DTSC to see if they can quietly abandon their legal AOC cleanup agreements and apply their version of a suburban residential cleanup standard, even though it would leave 95% of the contamination at the Santa Susana Field Lab permanently.”
Bumstead believes her 11-year-old daughter, a two-time cancer survivor, got sick because of the release of radiation from the site.
She added that if the California Department of Toxic Substances Control, which oversees the cleanup, doesn’t stop this effort by NASA “we will continue to be in danger of exposure to carcinogenic chemicals every rainy or windy day.”
The NASA facilities were not the only ones to contribute to the contamination at Santa Susana Field lab over the decades. The timetable for cleanup of other areas remains unclear.
The 2,850-acre area, which first appeared on the map in the 1940s, was once a cutting-edge collection of production plants, test sites and chemical labs. It was home to rocket-engine tests, the development of experimental liquid metals and nuclear energy research by private-sector and government scientists from such entities as Boeing, the U.S. Department of Energy and NASA.
The partial meltdown of a small experimental nuclear reactor in 1959, unrelated to the NASA sites being dismantled, left the area beset with radioactive and chemical pollution, experts say.
After decades of activism and negotiations, the government in 2010 agreed to clean up the site, but efforts since then have fallen short of promised goals and deadlines.
People ranging from environmental activists and nearby residents to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, Sen. Henry Stern, and members of Congress to reality TV celebrity Kim Kardashian West, who lives in nearby Hidden Hills, have urged action on the cleanups.
Over the years, experts have conducted studies on those who previously worked at the field lab along with research on rates of thyroid cancer among residents who live near the property.
In 2005, Boeing reached a settlement with more than 100 neighbors of the lab, who had said they developed cancer and other illnesses from the rocket-engine manufacturing plant. Boeing denies that there’s a link between the contamination and illnesses among nearby residents. Some have alleged that the area contributed to illnesses in the area, but the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health has said evidence doesn’t yet exist to support that assertion.
Over the years, about 1,500 claims were filed by employees who were diagnosed with cancer and worked at the site with the Department of Labor. More than $58 million has been paid out.
Meanwhile, NASA officials said they have taken steps to move some of the wildlife living in the area away from the demolition efforts. Three boxes were set up to serve as new nesting spots for barn owls, which have set up homes in or around the Bravo stands.
Biologists hope the owls, known for their white, heart-shaped faces, will soon relocate to the new boxes.
