Divine Strake bites the dust

Huntsman, others hail cancellation of blast

Surprised and delighted reactions greeted the federal government's announcement Thursday that the Divine Strake explosion has been canceled.

The proposed detonation of 700 tons of ammonium nitrate and fuel oil at the Nevada Test Site (NTS) was designed to test for ways to crack underground fortifications that might be built by an enemy.

Federal officials insisted that the test would be harmless, but opponents pointed to nuclear contamination at the NTS, leftovers from atomic testing decades ago, and said Divine Strake could cause radioactive particles from those tests to become airborne and drift off the base.

One scientist said five nuclear bomb explosions at the Test Site had left radioactive debris on the section where Divine Strake was planned. Also, the blast was planned for about a mile from material that the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (the federal agency that had proposed the test) said was contaminated.

The controversy was so strong that it had generated a federal lawsuit in Las Vegas. Many people in the Western states still remember vividly the health consequences of the earlier testing, including increases in some types of cancer in the fallout area. The federal government has since acknowledged the harm and compensated some victims but not all.

DTRA's announcement Thursday said cancellation was not based on any technical information that would indicate the test could harm workers, the general public or the environment. Instead, agency director James A. Tengelia said that it was "time to use alternative methods" to get needed information.

Nobody has methods to assess ways to defeat underground facilities, the release said. "The agency will develop advanced analysis techniques and conduct confirmatory experiments on a much smaller scale to assist in developing new capabilities."

The Deseret Morning News attempted to ask why the test was cancelled, if DTRA was convinced there would be no harm.

Don Kerr, spokesman for DTRA, reached at the agency's offices in Fort Belvoir, Va., said, "We don't have any further information than what's contained in the news release at this time."

Notably more cheerful and talkative were people who had opposed the test. These comments came Thursday:

• Utah Gov. Jon M. Huntsman Jr., speaking during an impromptu press briefing in his office: "For me and every other Utahn, we're jubilant. ... This should be a message loud and clear that the system does work."

Huntsman said the decision resulted largely from the number of comments that DTRA received from Utahns. He added that he had a meeting with the Defense Department last Friday and heard the news Thursday morning.

"I'm guessing they didn't want to stare us down," he added, tongue in cheek.

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