Santa Susana Field Laboratory

The SRE nuclear power plant on the SSFL site in 1958

The Santa Susana Field Laboratory (SSFL) is a formerly very important test center for missile and nuclear technology in the United States . It is located about 30 miles north of downtown Los Angeles, in the Simi Valley in the Simi Hills at the southern foot of the Santa Susana Mountains .

Among other things, the Saturn rockets for the Apollo missions ( Rocketdyne ) were built at the SSFL , the first civil-economic nuclear reactor was designed (the Sodium Reactor Experiment , which was used to supply the nearby town of Moorpark ) and as part of the SDI program Tests carried out.

Today the SSFL is operated as a private research facility of the Boeing Company.

Accidents and incidents

On July 26, 1959, a 30 percent core meltdown occurred in the nuclear reactor, a fast breeder with 7.5 MW, due to a blocked cooling duct . Most of the fission products could be filtered off. Most of the radioactive gases were released into the environment, which resulted in one of the largest iodine-131 releases in nuclear history. The accident, which is rated between 5 and 6 on the INES scale, was kept secret for a long time.

See also : Sodium Reactor Experiment # Incident in 1959  and list of accidents in nuclear facilities

In 2018, the area was affected by massive forest fires in California . However, initial measurements did not reveal any increased release of radioactivity and chemicals from the fire.

Web links

Commons : Santa Susana Field Laboratory  - Collection of Images, Videos, and Audio Files

• http://www.ssflpanel.org/

Individual evidence

1. ^ A. Lutins: US Nuclear Accidents. June 22, 2010, accessed March 13, 2011
2. ^ California Energy Commission: Nuclear Plants in California , May 1, 2006
3. ^ California fire near nuclear accident site . In: Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists , November 14, 2018. Retrieved November 15, 2018.

Coordinates: 34 ° 13 ′ 51 ″  N , 118 ° 41 ′ 47 ″  W.