![]() ![]() The under-slab drain lines were filled with masonry grout. ![]() ![]() It was feared that cutting the floor open would undermine the structural integrity of the building. The Navy chose to reroute these roof drains, instead of cutting through the floor slab and removing existing drain lines that were likely contaminated with radium paint waste. Last year the Navy re-routed about a dozen interior roof drains, which used to connect to lines under the building, to a new storm drain connection outside the building. The Navy set a conservative threshold for clearance to meet residential standards, even though only commercial and light industrial is planned for the building. Pockets of the concrete floor were removed with a grinder down to a depth of one inch and refilled. Ventilation duct work, insulation, drop ceiling, lighting, drain pipes, paint booth walls, office walls and a brick wall were removed. Using scanning bars, varying in length from three to five feet and wired to a computer, data was mapped centimeter by centimeter. This was a follow-up to the 2010 scanning and removal work. The potentially affected areas were confined to a small part at the center of the 910,000-square-foot complex. This affected at least five other areas at Alameda Point.ĭuring the summer, the Navy’s contractor scanned floors, walls and ceilings to detect paint residue and radium dust. ![]() The procedures for handling and disposing of the paint waste during the 1950s and 1960s led to costly and seemingly interminable cleanup projects once the base closed in 1997. Its risk comes from ingesting the element regularly, such as in industrial settings. Radium is a naturally occurring element found in miniscule amounts in soil and water posing no health risk. The aircraft hangar complex is where the Navy refurbished its planes, including repainting tiny instrument dials, switches, and markers with glow-in-the-dark paint that contained radium. And yet, as narrative text at the end of the movie reminds us, radium paint continued to be used well into the 1960s, putting countless lives at risk.The Navy has completed the final round of inspections and cleanup of the last traces of the radioactive metal called Radium-226 in Building 5 at Alameda Point. The case forced a reckoning within American industry, as workers realized they could sue their employers for unsafe working conditions, forcing the latter to better regulate potential dangers. Still, the women prevailed, and a jury awarded damages of $10,000 to each (roughly worth $150,000 in 2020), along with a $600 (about $9,000 now) a year payment for medical expenses. Indeed, by 1928, when the suit finally went to court, two were confined to their beds. The reason? They knew many of the women wouldn’t live out the decade. For several years, the “radium girls,” as they were dubbed in the press, battled a company determined to let the proceedings drag on for as long as possible. In the 1920s, a group of five women led by plant worker Grace Fryer decided to sue American Radium. There were three main factories in the United States dedicated to this work, but the most famous is the one in Orange, NJ, where Radium Girls is set. Radium dial painting started gaining traction around 1917 in the United States, to provide watches that soldiers heading off to the trenches of Europe could read in the dark. Though Bessie and Jo are based on composites of real people, the story itself is rooted in truth. ![]()
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