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Defense Department plans to detonate a 700-ton mixture of ammonium nitrate and fuel oil at the Nevada Test Site in late June should concern every Utahn.
The enormous blast, dubbed Divine Strake (not strike), is projected to send a debris cloud some 10,000 feet into the air.
Considering the debilitating downwind health problems caused by nuclear testing in Nevada a half century ago, a hefty dose of skepticism is warranted over the scheduled test. Indeed, the Defense Department ought not to go ahead with Divine Strake without credible assurances there'll be no adverse effect on residents in communities downwind from the test site.
Reliable answers to a couple of key questions are yet to be given:
-What proof exists that radioactive materials from earlier nuclear tests won't be stirred up and carried into the air by the blast?
-Is the conventional blast merely a prelude to the eventual resumption of nuclear testing at the Nevada site?
The government's track record for candor involving bomb testing in Nevada is dismal, at best. Thousands of innocent citizens still suffer the ill-effects of earlier nuclear blasts that were touted as being completely safe.
Without more openness and transparency, indeed, without believable assurances of downwind safety, this new test should not occur.
