b'C H A P T E R 15T H E S L-1 R EA CT O Rno one about in the freezing cold. They Meanwhile, in accordance with the at the intersection of Highway 20 andnote a slight trail of steam coming from emergency plan, CE and IDO authori- Fillmore Avenue. Security forces pre-the reactor building, a typical sight in ties had been notified. Around 9:20 pare to block Highway 20 traffic, ifthe cold. 13 p.m., John Horan, the IDO director of necessary. 14Health and Safety, answers the tele-The firemen enter the control building phone at home and then tells his wife, The environmental HPs take detectorscarrying radiation detection instruments. Theres been an accident. He leaves into the desert beyond the SL-1, look-They walk down the central corridor, for his Idaho Falls office where he has ing for radioactivity on the sagebrushcalling, inspecting each room. In one, radio communication with the entire that might have come from a cloud inthey see three lunch pails on a table. Site. As he passes the security desk, the the light breeze. Others head forFinding nothing amiss, they move guard tells him three people are miss- Highway 20 and collect samples there.toward the door at the bottom of the ing, but there is no fire. Horan orders an aircraft and asks thecovered stairway. The radiation indicator aerial-monitoring team to stand by.moves sharply. They withdraw. Horan declares a Class 1 emergency, Then he thinks better of an idea to sendmeaning the incident is restricted to one them on a night monitoring expedition.By 9:17 p.m., an HP from the MTR location. IDO personnel in Idaho Falls Heretofore, they had not practiced low-arrives and, together with a fireman, speed to the sitethe IDO duty officer, level night flights. They will fly at 6:30approaches the stairs. Each wears a environmental HPs, the medical direc- a.m. Meanwhile the ground surveyorsScott Air-Pak, a 40-pound tank of air tor and his assistant, others. The news conclude that the publicand theyharnessed and buckled onto the back goes to AEC Headquarters. The weath- can travel safely on Highway 20. 15with a hose to a face mask. It pumps air er station reports the direction of theto the face, so that if the mask leaks, air wind. The Radiological Assistance Planis expelled, protecting the wearer from goes into effect, activating the HPs indangerous gas or contaminated dust. As other complexes for response. The fire HPs check Highway 20 for contamination on thethe rescuers start up the stairs, the department sets up an operations trailer morning after the accident.detectors read 25 R/hr; they withdraw.By now, the security detail has deter-mined that the men are nowhere else atthe NRTS. Other searchers find no onein the SL-1 support buildings. Thegrowing crowd of rescuers is forced toconclude that three cadremen are some-where inside the very quiet reactorbuilding.In a few minutes, two more HPs arrive,dressed in fully protective clothing andequipped with Jordan Redectors, aninstrument able to detect gamma radia-tion up to 500 R/hr. One of themascends the stairs with two of the fire-men, a constant eye on the Jordan. At the top of the stairs, they discern damageinside, no men. The indicator needlepegs. The HPorders all to withdraw.INEEL 61-91 4 3'